Maedeup Monday!

The old say "two heads are better than one" is definitely the way our house runs. I was cleaning and organizing my craft room when I found a box of forgotten chilbo (Korean pendants) made by my chilbo teacher Kim Nan-Young and myself. I had thought over the years to add maedeup to them and wear them as necklaces and I did manage to do that to many. But how many necklaces can a girl wear?

So my next thought was to display them so I could enjoy them whenever I wanted to. Thoughts then went to how to display them and I came up with using maedeup as the way to display the pendants. The only thing I forgot was that the chilbo pieces are not light and they ended up stretching the maedeup.

Step in Rocketman who came up with the wooden dowel idea. The maedeup is tied onto the wooden dowel and he added hooks for the dowels to rest on. He also was the one who decided how to place the dowels on the wall. He did a great job and I love it!

                                                       Here are closeups of all the pendants.

I am feverishly working on my latest children's book while the next is brewing in my head. I start by writing down a synopsis of the story. Then comes the words to each page. I follow with a quick sketch of each page. When that is finished I start to draw the actual pages. But during each step the story may go in a different direction or I feel I need to add a page or remove one. After everything is drawn, I paint. Rocketman adds the text after he scans the pages. It sounds like a lot of work and it is but I'm loving it. It feels so good to have my creativity back.

Chilbo (Korean Enameling) Class with Nan-Young!

I was lucky enough to spend a total of two days taking chilbo classes with Nan-Young. I always have my camera ready and she loves to use it to take pictures of me. Nowadays I make sure to have her warn me so I can slip off my readers. 

She is using a new platform to show her new work called KakaoStory and I had Rocketman set it up on my IPhone so I could see what she was doing. I chose two projects from all her new work to make during my class. I just love how this turned out. She still has it to frame for me and then my friend, Hannah, is going to ship it to me.

                                 I also made this pendant. This is how it looked before firing.

 After firing it was made into a necklace using maedeup made by Young-Soo. 

                     I also made this Korean dancer. I love it so much! This was before firing.

                                                                And after firing.

                                            Nan-Young loves to draw me instructions.

Metal Guy also stopped by during class. He is the photographer for Nan-Young's jewelry. Here he is using his new Samsung Galaxy to take a picture of her latest earrings.

During class, she took out this book and showed it to me.

As I opened the book, I saw it was a brush painting book and she had painted all the pictures in the book. Here are a few of the paintings.

It turns out it was a book of her desire to find a mate. When I met her in 2008, she was married but her husband lived and worked three hours away. She rarely saw him and was glad because he was quite abusive. She divorced and raised her daughter. But now that her daughter is graduating, she wants to have someone to spend her life with. She's had a few boyfriends over the years but she hasn't found the one yet. I was deeply moved by her book and saw the parallel of the birds and her hope for a mate. Then she gave me the book! I tried to give it back but she refused. She did some last minute touches to it and I videoed it. You can find it at the end of this post.

Nan-Young had me and Rocketman sign a brass square. I didn't know why she wanted it but we soon found out.

                              Rocketman found out that chilbo is harder than it looks.

                               She added some touches to Rocketman's square.

                            When they were fired and cooled, Nan-Young added them to this wall.

                                                        This was so beautiful!

                                                                           Here we are!

                                         This is on the side of her building.

                         We left with presents from Nan-Young. These are refrigerator magnets.

                                          I bought these rings for myself and my sisters.

                                                      She gave Rocketman this tie.

                                She also gave me these two fans that she had hand painted.

It is always so hard to say goodbye to her. I shed tears even though I know I will see her again but I miss the good old days of weekly lessons. But I feel blessed that at least I have yearly lessons.

Here is the video I shot of Nan-Young:

Chilbo (Korean Enameling) Class with Nan-Young 2014

On my way to my first chilbo class with Nan-Young, I saw this exhibition going on in a nearby building. The artist had made ceramic hanoks. Each one unique and different. I was going to be late for class so I stopped for just a moment, ran to class and brought Nan-Young back with me. She had no idea it was there.

                                          I bought this one for 30,000 WON ($30 USD).

                        Nan-Young bought a couple too and we even got these free gifts.

This is the artist. What a talent.

     In chilbo class, I made this hair piece.

 I also made this. Both were made out of sterling silver. I had forgotten how much I missed my classes.

                                                                          Finished!

Young-Soo had closed her noodle shop and now has a maedeup shop in the basement of a local building. She made this maedeup piece to go along with the chilbo. She took maedeup lessons from the same place that I took all those years ago.  A small world it is!

 Hannah went a long with us to my class and she took this picture of me and my peeps. From left to right: Young-Soo, me, Rocketman, Nan-Young and Metal guy. I love these guys so much.

                                                         I also ran into my bodyguard.

                                         Now if I could just get him to smile for a picture.

Rocketman took a lot of photos while we were in Suwon. Now if I could get Nan-Young to smile too!

                                                              This is outside her shop.

                                A very cool picture Rocketman took of Nan-Young's shop.

                                                                 Her storefront.

                                          Then we had bibimbap for dinner, Seoul-style.

                                                             A bowl of deliciousness!