Fanciful Animals Head for the Hospital / October 1, 2019 by Layl McDill

About a year ago I was contacted by Aesthetics, Inc., an art consultant firm which I had worked with on several previous projects for the Minneapolis Children’s hospital in 2012. This time they asked me to first create one 30” x 40” playground piece and then, this summer, I was commissioned to do three additional 30” x 30” pieces, all for the Stanford Lucile Packard Children's Hospital in San Diego.

I love thinking about how these pieces will be enjoyed in a hospital setting. I can see how they would serve as a much needed distraction for a family going through a tough time.

Below are the artist statements that went with each piece.

Artist Statement: This sculpture started from a sketch of a bird that I saw on an ancient piece of art in a museum. It was a very loose sketch that I doodled over later. At first it was just an "ordinary fanciful" bird but then I thought of the concept of having his feathers be paintbrushes. Later, while I was traveling in San Antonio, walking on their River Walk, seeing all the small waterfalls gave me the idea of adding a waterfall to my "watercolor bird". I love the idea that this bird has his paints and brushes wherever he goes along his own waterfall to help him create his own amazing watercolor paintings!

Artist Statement: If you hang out with a toddler for any length of time you know that they are fascinated by all things with wheels. I was lucky enough to spend a week with my 2-year-old nephew, playing with him and all his trucks and trains and then going with him to the zoo where we saw all kinds of animals. That's when this alligator came to my imagination with multiple kinds of transportation on his textured body and, of course, riding his own bike!

Artist Statement: One day while drawing a picture of a moose it occurred to me that the average moose is very tall - so tall that it would make a great marionette stage. I made marionettes as a child and I always wanted a stage for them. I never imagined that a moose would be an ideal stage!

It’s been interesting to create pieces for this project because the process is so much more controlled than I am used to. I often create with just a vague idea in my head. Sometimes I have a doodle that starts my creation, but it is never fully figured out. With this project I had to design 6 full-color sketches for submission and then wait to hear which three they would choose. Once they chose, I had to stick closely to my submitted design when making each piece. Admittedly, I did take some artistic liberties. Most were not a problem, but after submitting the final images of the new pieces, I found there was one feather I had forgotten on the chin of the Watercolor Waterfall Bird; the piece did not match! Luckily this was an easy fix.

I’m very much used to having total artistic freedom, working to sell each piece to the right customer, so this was a very different way of working. Did I like it? Well, I had fun making these pieces, for sure, but I must admit the pieces I enjoyed making the most were the ones that were less planned out. Still, when it comes to making public art, it is more of a group effort and less that of an individual artist working alone in her studio. A lot of good things can come from this method-- like three happy animals making kids smile in San Diego!

Inspiration from my Grandmothers / July 24, 2019 by Layl McDill

Recently I’ve been pondering the influence of my grandmothers on my art style. Each has since passed away but during my childhood they were a strong part of my life since my family visited them often. When we lived in Fort Collins, Colorado, it was only 45 minutes to see my Grandma McDill in Cheyenne. Those trips seemed to take forever as we were always so excited to see her. Eventually we moved to Gillette, Wyoming, making it a 4-hour drive, but closer to my other Grandmother who lived in Fort Collins. We would often visit both Grandmothers in one trip. Thinking back, I realize now how much those visits influenced me as an artist.

A few years ago someone commented that my art reminded them of Indonesian art. This was a major revelation—of course! My maternal grandmother, aka G.B., spent many years in Indonesia while her husband worked for an oil company. One of their work benefits was free shipping back to the US. Wow, did my grandmother take advantage of that! She shipped huge pieces of handcrafted furniture back by shipping container, full. She collected everything! And then, once back in The States, she decorated her house with all of her fantastic treasures. Most intriguing to me were always the Wayang Golek puppets and the shadow puppets or Wayang Kulit puppets. When you look at the way these figures are covered with swirly, fanciful designs it’s easy to see the connection to my work today.

The Box of Office Supplies from Grandma McDill

Growing up in Wyoming, I didn’t get to go to many museums; they were too far away. But visiting G.B.’s house was like getting to spend the night in one. If you were the lucky grandkid you even got to sleep in what we called the “princess bed,” a large, canopied Chinese bed from the Qing dynasty. I’ll never forget laying there mornings, studying the carvings of dragons, mountains, clouds and figures. I am sure the many nights spent in that bedroom had to have inspired my own creative spirit. This furniture, and other pieces, also must have fed my love for small drawers. Come to find out now, from my historian sister, those drawers would have been used for opium!

Grandma McDill, my grandmother in Cheyenne, lived much more modestly in a tiny post-war Veterans house with very little room to move around, let alone have dinner together. But she also had fabulous drawers; full of office supplies. I hadn’t really thought much about how much I loved to play with her office supplies until recently when I inherited one of several full boxes. In the box was all the usual stuff, along with some unusual things, like rubber letter stamps to make personalized return address labels, and old label makers that indented into hard plastic strips and stencils and tube paint. Seeing all these ancient office supplies reminded me how generous and open-minded my Grandma McDill was. She always let us rummage through these drawers and play with all the fun supplies, anyway we wanted. I learned my love for the everyday object from these sessions, how to see them as mysterious and magical.

My grandmothers were very different, but their taste, and their way of living, influenced me greatly as a child. It’s hard to know what I would be like as an artist without the inspirational seeds they planted all those years ago. I still have such a love for all Asian art and seek it out at every museum I visit. I continue to get excited about interesting found objects that are really just a simple tool or office supply.

How We Bought a Building / February 14, 2019 by Layl McDill

One of the first classes taking place in my new studio in the Flux Arts Building

My husband Josh and I have dreamed of buying a building for as long as we can remember. We bought our first house back in 1995; that was the home of our first studio. It worked great because the house was a duplex: the rent for the other space completely covered our mortgage. When we moved our studios to our first commercial location on Central Avenue, we had to start paying rent. We soon realized that buying a building was our ultimate goal for financial stability.

That first studio/showroom on Central was the first of many buildings we tried to buy. The asking price was too high, so we looked elsewhere. At that time, in 2004, our business was too new for banks to take the risk and the spaces available weren’t very good fits. Thinking back on it, the banks were smart. We weren’t ready for the responsibility of a building on top of trying to get our business off the ground.

So we moved to the Keg House Arts Building and signed a five year lease. When those five years were almost up, we looked around again, but nothing was available. Another five-year lease came and went and we looked again. We came close to moving, but things weren’t right: wrong price, wrong space, not worth moving. So we signed on for another three years and then looked again. This time we thought we found the perfect space but there was an issue with a previous offer that the bank was waiting to be resolved. We had to make a decision, so we signed another two-year lease. We thought we would have to wait a lot longer, at this point, but then Josh saw this building only 5 blocks from our house in the Holland Neighborhood.

It was BIG and it needed A LOT of work. I’d never even noticed it before because it really was too ugly to notice. Josh was very interested. People were working on emptying it when he stopped to ask about it. It was a tax forfeit property. I thought it looked like way too much work. Josh thought it looked interesting. He researched all about tax forfeited property and it sounded really hard to get if you weren’t a contractor with A LOT of cash. But he was still interested. He kept biking by it everyday and trying to peek inside. He kept calling the city about it. I kept thinking he was crazy!

Then on a very cold day in January 2017 there was an open tour of the building. Josh went to see what he could before his toes froze. Malcom Potek of Potek Glass also happened to be there. By the end of that week we had a plan —a partnership with Malcom and his wife, Kara Van Wyk, to buy the building.

Our team on Building Buying Day. Yep, that’s me on Josh’s shoulder! (I was actually in Florida,)

I still thought this was crazy, but then we connected with Jennifer Young and John Krammer from the California Building Company and asked them to be our contractors. This made me feel much more hopeful as they knew all the ins and outs of working with the city and they knew how to rehab old buildings. Their two biggest projects, The California Building and the Casket Arts Building, proved that. So we quickly put together a proposal. At least the city had put out a request for proposals and the building would be sold for a solid asking price, not putting it out for bids. We had a chance. For once it wasn’t all about who had the most money, but who had the best ideas.

We met with the city to talk about our proposals and what do you know? They picked us! So began an entire year of getting all the paperwork and loans lined up. I felt like I was learning a new language. By now I’ve forgotten it all; let’s just say it was very challenging and much like a part time job! We had three lenders in the game: Sunrise Bank, SBA and the City of Minneapolis with a 2% loan. In February 2018 we were officially the owners of this building; construction could begin. The California Company partnered with Raven Construction. The building was gutted. For months we mostly just watched, but we did get in on the fun of stripping wallpaper and cleaning old light fixtures.

The exciting part was discovering the garage doors that were bricked in. But this discovery meant we had to change our plans. It took some major moments of decision making, but eventually our architect, Tim Gaetz, designed the spaces so they really fit and made sense with what the building was. All summer and fall last year we watched the transformation. It was so exciting to see holes being cut for windows and then paint going on the outside and then the inside. The fall felt like forever because we were so anxious to get in and start making it our space. Finally on December 23rd we moved!

When I’m in my studio I feel like I am living a dream. It think back to when I was in college and we did a visualization project about imagining your future. I remember the perfect studio I imagined back then and it was no where near as fabulous as this one! I have so much room for all my supplies and a big wall for all my art. And the space for classes is amazing. This year I have so much travel planned (as I write this I am in Florida doing art fairs) that I know that every minute I am in my new studio, I will be so grateful. We had so much help from everyone involved to make this happen!

What a journey it has been to get to this point! It also took us nearly the full two years to land on the best name for the building. But we finally decided on the Flux Arts Building. Which I think fits this building that has transformed from the ugliest building, which you would never even notice, into something so full of creativity and life.

Above are some before images- as you can see A LOT of work needed to be done!

A section of my BIG wall of art in my new studio.

A Device Monster Ate My Summer / November 9, 2018 by Layl McDill

Earlier this year my friend Barbara Bridges invited me to be a part of her new nonprofit “Art to Change the World” and its fall event. She is what I call a social practice artist who has created art about such things as gluten and water pollution. I think the first thing I said to her was “well, I’m not a social practice artist,” but then she told me more about what she does and I got intrigued. The concept for the event was for each artist to choose an issue and then connect with an expert in the field, or someone living with the issue, to get more information and insight into the subject. Hmmm. This was definitely something new.

Before I knew it, I was head of the promotions committee and knee deep into volunteering for this exciting new group. Barbara was great at directing me to an issue that had connections for me. At first we called my idea “Device Addiction,” but when I talked to my 18-year-old daughter about it, she told me that the title was very off putting, seeming to blame the user. I had recently read an article about the way technology is designed to pull you in, making it difficult to let go, so I decided to call my issue “Persuasive Technology.”

It wasn’t long before I realized how easy it was to research my subject, because it popped up in conversation constantly. My friend, an art school teacher, told me she was worried kids were losing empathy because they weren’t learning how to interact when they were young. I also found it everywhere in the news. I read a book titled “Breaking up with Your Phone” by Catherine Price. I started to form the concept of creating a “Device Monster” sculpture that would embody how we feel when our technology is so integrated into our lives.

Then over the course of the summer I found two “topic voices” to talk to, offering a wider view of my topic. First I spoke with Mark Teresa, who is family therapist. He told me he was seeing the effects too. We talked about how much of what people experience today is behind a screen; it’s not hands-on or tactile. He lamented a loss of personal “alone time” because we always have our devices handy, with hundreds of people just a finger tap away. After speaking to him I got the idea to make my monster holding up a large screen in front.

Work in progress: adding kids climbing together on the sculpture.

I then met with my other topic voice, Angie Kalthoff, who is a K-12 technology integrationist. Her focus is meaningful technology integration, focusing on opportunities for technology creation, rather than consumption through devices. She told me about the many positive ways that technology can be used in the classroom and how she is working to create more projects and to teach teachers to use them. In younger grades they aren’t using screens to do programming, but as building blocks. It was very heartening to hear this positive view of the devices with which we are interacting daily. She also told me about Marina Umaschi Bers who’s given a TED Talk on how technology can either be a playpen, that traps a child with limited “toys,” or a playground, where a child can experiment and interact with other kids, learning through play. This was very exciting to me and became a major part of my piece.

As my sculpture evolved, I added many symbols for the way technology can be both negative and positive. I was at a meeting when I was nearly done, when I saw a friend’s phone light up with a text message, next to their arm. This gave me the idea to make my device’s arms covered with text messages. What better place to find actual messages then to ask my friends on FaceBook? So I crowdsourced a bunch of texts which I then transferred to the arms of my monster.

I also wanted an interactive piece, so I asked viewers to include their feelings about technology by writing a “good, bad, or ugly” statement onto a piece of paper, rolling it up and then adding it to the Device Monster’s tail. At the final exhibit, titled “See. Say. DO,” my monster got a bunch of tail spikes! I also learned even more about how technology impacts lives by talking to the viewers. One of my favorite moments was when I was showing my piece to some attendees and they talked about how teens sometimes sit around a table and text each other. At that moment a teen just happen to be listening in and they told us why this happens: sometimes teens are dealing with anxiety in social situations. Texting helps them get through it. This sparked an eye-opening conversation for all involved.

It was amazing to be part of this project and I could go on and on about the other surprising things that happened during the eleven-day event. The concept of working with a “topic expert” is something I would love to do again. Who knows? After this, I might just start to make more “social practice art.”

Even my parents were able to see the exhibit!

What Can a Zoo Do? / July 4, 2018 by Layl McDill

While I was down south this spring I had time to wander around Jackson, Mississippi. One day I ended up driving down a road with a sign that said ZOO. It was a beautiful afternoon and I thought- "I really would like to get my own photos of animals to create some pieces I have been thinking about." So I followed the signs to the Jackson Zoo .

I was thrilled to discover that the first animal I encountered was a giraffe; this was exactly the animal I was hoping for! Recently I had been forming an idea for a piece involving a large drawing of a giraffe transferred onto clay. I was also lucky this giraffe was in the perfect position to capture lots of up close photos, so I snapped away.

Then I moved on to the mountain lions and I started to think about the controversy surrounding zoos. It was obvious that these three mountain lions had nowhere near the amount of room that a mountain lion in the wild really needed. But then they started playing around, chasing each other just like domesticated cats; it was so entertaining! Here I was enjoying them for my own personal enjoyment while knowing all along that mountain lions need many miles to roam to be truly happy. It's such a tough dilemma because zoos also are super important when it comes to preservation. This was especially apparent as I moved on through the zoo.

The zoo did a great job on their description panels, explaining the causes for the endangerment to the animals on view and even gave pointers as to what people can do in their daily lives to help. Then I got to the highlight of the zoo: the white rhino. This one-ton beast is amazing to view in real life! I was super lucky that he was also on the move and ready to pose for photos. There are only around 20,000 southern white rhinos in the world, so seeing one in real life is a rare experience. They were even thought to be extinct for awhile. Northern white rhinos are, sadly, headed for extinction, as the last male died this past March.

Does a visit to the zoo help us realize how precious and incredible all the animals on this earth are? I think it does. For me, as an artist, I can take it a step further by creating art inspired by these animals and share it with the world. I have since created the giraffe piece I was contemplating the day I took all those photos. As I worked, I thought a lot about how many amazing animals there are in the world. There is talk of being able to bring back extinct species with science. It's not going to be an easy task, or possibly even a good idea. When I finished my piece I decided to call it "How to Build a Giraffe," as a way of highlighting this topic. Resurrecting animals is not something we can do (yet), so wouldn't it be better to save what we do have?

I still feel ambivalent about zoos. Years ago I listened to a Stuff You Should Know podcast called "Are Zoos Good or Bad for Animals" which really laid out the pros and cons. Upon listening to it again, it became evident to me that there are going to be zoos that do it right and those that don't. There is constant controversy and research on this subject. One animal at the center of attention right now is the Elephant, possibly my next subject for a piece. My goal is to create art that not only celebrates the animal kingdom but also encourages people to examine our human relationship with each animal. In this way I can use art to help keep attention on this important topic.

Three Museums across the Country / March 14, 2018 by Layl McDill

I recently went to three amazing shows in three states: Ohio, Florida and Minnesota. I feel so lucky that I get to travel and see so much inspirational art everywhere I go. I saw spectacular glass work at the Toledo Art Museum's Glass Pavilion at a show titled "Fired Up: Contemporary Glass by Women Artists." I was overwhelmed by ceramics at the Boca Raton Museum of Art at the show "Regarding George Ohr: Contemporary Ceramics in the Spirit of the Mad Potter." Then back home at the Minneapolis Institute of Art, I was stunned by the show "Power and Beauty in China’s Last Dynasty: Concept and Design by Robert Wilson."

In Toledo, the glass work included many types of glass techniques which I had never seen before, some of which could be transferred over to polymer clay. Especially this glass thread bowl by Toots Zynsky. I have layered threads of clay before but not in as much mass or with such color control as this, so who knows what I can do on, say a teapot, if I layered threads to this extreme.

Toots Zynsky's Vessel at the Toledo Art Museum

There is something about seeing pieces like this in real life as opposed to just as an flat image seen online. Especially when it comes to amazing three-dimensional pieces that have something going on at every angle. The piece "Beauty and Drama" by Ginny Ruffner has so much action and personality. I was excited about the way she added "drawings of faces" to her sculptures which is similar to what I have been playing around with but not as dimensionally as Ruffner has taken the concept.

Ginny Ruffner Beauty as Drama #141-52.jpg

While traveling from one art fair to another I was able to stop in Boca Raton to go to the show featuring ceramic artists that were influenced by George Ohr. Now these artist's work are going to be influencing me! It's probably not hard to see how the sculptures by the Haas Brothers can relate to my layering of polymer clay. It made me think more about attempting to be more "monochromatic" with some of my pieces.

Glenn Barkley's piece "Melancholic Vase" also has an inspirational monochomatic texture that I can see applying to my teapots.

When I returned to Minneapolis I couldn't wait to see the special exhibit at the Minneapolis Institute of Art. This show is multi-sensory and a true experience which I won't describe too much in detail because you really have to go to it and hear, see and even smell it! There are 10 rooms in which a different feeling is evoked through installations of ancient art from the Qing dynasty. The second room was an inspiration overload for me. I felt like I could stay there drawing for hours on end. All the treasures are placed in a cube which is viewed through a wire grid. I did half a dozen loose sketches which I will go back to and doodle over.

Qing Vase on display at "Power and Beauty in China's Last Dynasty"

After experiencing all these museums in the last month I am bursting with a feeling of wonderment that sets me up to see even my ordinary daily life as filled with inspiration. After visiting the Minneapolis Institute of Art I found myself looking around my dining room and seeing the objects I have collected in a new light. Back in the studio I created a series of pieces on mirrors which were fed by the new visuals I have taken in, both at the museums and in my daily life. It's so essential for an artist to keep adding to the "soup" of images and textures and experiences of your imagination.

Adventures in Art Fairs / November 19, 2017 by Layl McDill

Nearly every weekend I hop in my van (full of my art and my displays) and venture out into the great unknown. Each time there are questions. Will my car make it? Will the weather hold? Will I make any money? Will the place I stay at have a decent bed?? Each weekend I discover: anything can happen!

Shelves of teapot sculptures at the beginning of the summer.

After 20-plus years of doing the art fair scene I am anything but bored. I still get butterflies in my stomach when I drive up to the site and get ready to setup. The other day it occurred to me that it's a bit like a gambling addiction. At every venue you throw the dice in hopes that the right person will come into your booth (or a bunch of right people!). And just maybe someone will say "I'd like to purchase that..." and point to your biggest piece! If it weren't for the fact that it has happened before I might not be so willing to believe. But it does, again and again, so every weekend I cross my fingers and hope!

Life on the road, as an art fair artist, is one of those things you have to love to keep doing year after year. To me, the hardest part is the long drive home on Sunday night. Tear down is tough and can be backbreaking, but I have to say I actually enjoy the challenge of trying to get it done in less than an hour and a half. I know it seems crazy, but I find that I enjoy it more when I try to hurry. It must be my competitive spirit - competing against my time the week before, in the hope of getting on the road quicker. I also enjoy the challenge of packing up my van like a perfect puzzle. This year I have even been able to fit a bike in along with all my work, which is really an accomplishment, since bikes are oddly shaped.

Being outdoors is one of my favorite things about art fairs. This summer it occurred to me that it is a little like camping with your art. Especially when you are in beautiful settings in parks or by lakes. I always feel like I am a ten-year-old kid setting up my fort. I get to make a fort with my favorite things: my own art and my art supplies, since I also make work while I'm at shows. And yes, the weather can also be the worst part about doing shows. Over the years I've had my share of bad learning experiences with wind. One show, early on, I arrived at the show on the second day to find my booth had collapsed overnight. Another time, about 10 years ago, I was called at 2 am and told my booth had blown over. Then there was the worst case, when my booth blew into a shelf of ceramics of the artist next to me. All very stressful experiences! I am fairly confident in the construction of my booth now, so it's unlikely this will happen again, but I never know what Mother Nature has in store for me, down the line.

Loring Park is a beautiful art fair right on the lake with the city of Minneapolis in the background.

Of course the most fascinating thing about traveling around the country to do art fairs is meeting people. As I have traveled further from the Midwest, it has been really interesting to take part in festivals in other parts of the country. I feel like I get to know the area by just meeting and talking to people in each place. When I did my first show in Tennessee last year, I found it interesting how much more engaged the husbands were down there than they generally are up in Minnesota. They stopped and asked me questions, so much so that one wife eventually became bored, and started to leave her husband behind! It's also really cool when I see customers I know from other art fairs when I am across the country, far from the original place I met them! It makes it seem like a small world.

One of my favorite resources for discovering shows is the Art Fair Sourcebook. If you are serious about doing art fairs, this subscription is for you. I love to use their map search to find shows located in the same area, around the same time. It can be very challenging, though, to get into the right shows at the right time; this really is like playing the lottery! Another great resource for learning about art fairs is Art Fair Insiders. This website has endless tips and reviews that really help any artist in the art fair world.

I don't see myself retiring from art fairs any time soon. I am looking forward to traveling even more in the coming years, as my children graduate and move out. I have hopes that as the world switches to online shopping everywhere, eventually people will crave REAL experiences and art fairs will be one of the best places to get that. It's such a great venue for connecting with customers, year after year. I just love that people tell me about the pieces they bought from me "way back," in the beginning of my career. To know that they are still enjoying my art is really my ultimate goal!

Finding My Way to Clay / July 18, 2017 by Layl McDill

I will never forget the first polymer clay bead I ever saw. It was about 5/8 inch tall and had a tiny giraffe in it. I was amazed- how did they put a tiny giraffe in the colors of the clay? I figured it must be tiny little strands of clay put together. Eventually I came across polymer clay at the craft store. I'm not even sure how I knew this was the right material to use but I had grown up trying lots of crafts in 4-H so I was willing to just dive in and see what happened.

So it was during a Christmas break from art school when I was home with my little sisters that I made my first millefiori attempt. This meant making long skinny noodles of clay and stacking them together to try to build a clown face. Needless to say it didn't work at all --but hey this colored clay was still pretty fun.

The page in the  Klutz Clay book that changed my life. — The page in the Klutz Clay book that changed my life.

A year and half later I picked up the Klutz book that came with polymer clay and gave basic instructions on all kinds of polymer clay techniques. I flipped through and saw the photo of a big ghost and a small ghost! A huge light bulb popped up above my head! That's so obvious- make it big and then make it small! I couldn't wait to try it out. I had accumulated lots of clay but hadn't done much more than twist it together to make simple designs. So I went to the studio and took all the clay I had to make my first design. Did I start with something simple, like a flower or a star? No! I made a ballerina gorilla - of course! It took all the clay I had and was probably about 3 inches in diameter.

As you can imagine it did not turn out at all. Once I made it small it nearly disappeared and the colors squished in a lot of ways that I did not expect, but I was still amazed with the concept and confident that I could eventually figure it out. At the time I was doing lots of mixed media sculptures so if my attempts with clay didn't work I could swirl the colors together and add it my sculptures some how.

Gradually, over the next five years, I began to figure out the technique. I made smaller, simpler canes that helped me figure things out. I still loved to attempt huge canes. It's not that I planned to make them huge; they just ended up that way. I still remember one of my first big fish that I made right before my first daughter was born. It started with big eyes and then it ended up about the size of dinner plate, with a height of 4 inches.

I was starting to get so obsessed with clay that I even thought I might bring some clay with me to hospital when my baby was born. Luckily I stopped myself from that but I did eventually figure out that playing with clay and taking care of my kids was a very good fit. I packed up clay to go with me wherever we went- to the park, to the children's museum, to dentist appointments, to soccer games, etc.

My way of learning millefiore was through lots of trial and error. Mostly error. Luckily each time something didn't work out I would see some parts that did and be determined to make it work the next time. I still remember how disappointed I was many times but I was so fascinated with the technique that I kept going. I often think I would not have been able to live with all these mistakes if it had not been for my mixed media sculptures. I was able to use up my not-so-perfect slices in these pieces. One of these series was "Crazy Legged Angels" which had fabric bodies and polymer clay feet. I sold hundreds of these and even did a large wholesale catalog order which gave me the "excuse" to make lots of canes.

I also made a lot of "picture holders" which were shapes of polymer clay with wire sticking out. These just had random slices of clay all over them so it was fine that the pictures didn't really look like something. But of course my goal was to get them to look like something, eventually. Eventually they did. Over the past 20-plus-years of playing with clay, I have continued to learn how the clay works and the best ways to make elongated shapes in clay that actually look like something. So far I've made hundreds of designs and animals in clay- even a giraffe, my version of that first giraffe I never have forgotten.

The Giraffe cane I made about 10 years ago, which now hangs on my "Archive Wall". — The Giraffe cane I made about 10 years ago, which now hangs on my "Archive Wall".

To see more of my canes in progress, visit my Silly Milly Facebook page.

The History of Millefiori / April 7, 2017 by Layl McDill

I am constantly asked "How long does it take you to make things?" My answer is usually "it's in-calculable" and then I go on to share how I make all the parts and pieces because I think that is REALLY what people are asking. Of course it's very hard to explain in a nutshell how I build tiny images into chunks of clay because most people have never heard of the ancient process of Millefiori.

First of all, the word "millefiori" means "thousand flowers" in Italian, which is where this technique was mastered in glass, mainly in Murano, the island off of Venice, famous for glass art. When I went there, I hoped to see someone creating millefiori in glass but I guess it isn't as showy as glass blowing because that's all they were demonstrating. If you have seen the tiny little flowers in a glass paperweight (or on a vase) you were most likely looking at Murano millefiori.

But I'm getting ahead of myself because the technique was used long before it got it's name. In fact, it was originally called "mosaic glass." It actually dates back as far as Egyptian times but I have found very little information on Egyptian millefiore, except what I have seen in person. In 2014, when I went to the Louvre in Paris, there was this chunk of glass with a cow in it! It was an amazingly detailed millefiori glass and it's many hundreds of years old. Egyptians were using the millefiori technique as far back as 1400 BCE. This isn't the best photo, below, since I took it through the glass, but you can also see a cane of glass with a geometric design next to it too.

So just think what it took for the Egyptians to get a cow into that tiny piece of glass (it was about 1 inch in diameter). I am sure they did it the same way, generally, that they do with glass now, which is somewhat similar to the way I work with polymer clay. The concept is to place rods of colored glass together to form the shape. These rods are short, but once heated up they can quickly stretch out the cane to make it any size diameter needed. I've never seen it done, but hope to some day. There is a great article on How Stuff Works that takes you through the whole process.

I love to search for more Egyptian millefiore whenever I go to an art museum but it is rarely found. I did see some at the Metropolitan Musuem of Art, back in 2000, when I was just getting started in polymer clay. Once you get to Roman times there is a lot more to be found. They made a lot of half faces that they sliced and put together to make a whole face. They are pretty creepy looking, really, but you can see that they are based on Greek and Roman theater masks.

The Romans seemed to have shared the millefiori technique with Europe in the 7th and 8th Century. Then the technique disappeared until the 18th Century, when the glass artists of Murano started to use millefiori on their trading beads, which were traded primarily in Africa. The technique of millefiori was widely used for African trading beads because they could produce so many of these detailed beads much quicker than any other glass bead technique. The glass artists of Murano had many secret glass techniques that the Italian government wanted to keep secret. (Check out this history of glass from Britannica.com). They didn't even allow the glass workers to leave the island! But the glass artists of Altare (a second great center of glass-making in Italy) were much more free in sharing their knowledge, so gradually techniques including millefiore started to spread.

One of the most amazing glass millefiore artists from the 19th Century was Giacomo Franchini. I have an amazing book about him and other millefiore artists of his time titled "Miniature Masterpieces: Mosaic Glass 1838-1924" by Giovanni Sarpellon. The detailed portraits that Franchini created were like none other! Check out this page from the book that shows one of his most famous canes of Giuseppe Garibaldi. If you ever come across a vase or paperweight at an antique shop or estate sale with tiny faces like these floating around it in it, snatch it up - it could be worth thousands! A group of three signed pieces (meaning a cane with his initials GBF) were recently sold at auction for $11,875!

Millefiori beads from Murano are still some the of the highest quality you will find in the world but of course other companies are always trying to emulate their beauty. India, China and Indonesia manufacture their own versions that are similar but it is obvious that they do not have the years of continued craftsmanship to compare with work from Murano. Here is a good article to help you identify the "non-Murano" bead.

Artists all over the world have been creating some pretty fantastic glass millefiori in recent years. I am doing some research on these artists and hope to write an upcoming blog about them. I do so admire the skills of those creating millefiori in glass because it must be much more difficult than in polymer clay. For one thing, they are working with materials they can't touch, plus they have to deal with glass that hardens and stretches at different rates.

I often wonder if polymer clay artists would have been able to come up with millefiori without the long history of craftsmen keeping the technique alive over the centuries. It seems that the technique did come and go over the years, so maybe it could have been invented on it's own. The concept really is very basic. For me, I just needed to begin with the idea of starting short and squat and then, later, working longer. But I certainly could have learned a lot faster if I had a master to teach me some basic tricks- like height-to-width ratios and reduction methods. I learned mostly by trial and error. Luckily I came up with ways to use my not-so-beautiful mistakes on work that I could sell and therefor buy more clay to try again. Now artists that are learning have the internet to go to and tutorials galore. Which is awesome, because it means that the techniques of millefiori in polymer clay will not disappear anytime soon!

This is one of my first canes (made in 1997).  My first five years or so of creating canes I made them way too short, so reducing was very hard.  I would end up with about half that wouldn't work out!  This cane did have a lot that di… — This is one of my first canes (made in 1997). My first five years or so of creating canes I made them way too short, so reducing was very hard. I would end up with about half that wouldn't work out! This cane did have a lot that did work and was one of my early favorites that kept me hopeful that I would one day figure it out!

Here is a bead made from my lobster cane.

Inspiration Interview / January 8, 2017 by Layl McDill

My friend Beth Wegener from the Polymer Clay Guild of Minnesota is going to be interviewing me soon for a talk at the International Polymer Clay Association about inspiration. She sent me a nice list of questions that really got me thinking. So I thought, to get my juices really going on the subject, I would write a blog on the ever elusive subject of inspiration.

This is one of my favorite questions to answer: "Where do you get your ideas?" I never seem to answer it the same way twice because the simple answer is "everywhere"—but that isn't what people want to hear. So I often talk about how I get ideas from different types of art, including children's book illustration (Dr. Suess of course!), Asian art, Indonesian art (my Grandmother's house was filled with Indonesian puppets and furniture from Indonesia), graffiti and pop art. Or sometimes it's easier to talk about specific pieces and tell the story of their conception because every piece has it's own unique story.

I have lots of different methods for getting inspired; sometimes I think for me it is hard NOT to be inspired. I often say it is like a spigot in my brain: ideas want to flow in, non-stop. Sometimes I have to just turn it off so I can move through my day but, when it's time to get ideas, I just turn it on again. It's often on when I am out for a walk, just looking at the world around me, or on long drives across the country. It is especially turned on when I am traveling in strange places or in museums.

One question Beth had for me was about how nature has inspired my art. I think most artists will answer that nature is a big part of their inspiration process. I know I have recently been inspired more and more by nature. Since I grew up in Wyoming, where nature was all the art I ever saw, I think for a long time I really rebelled against the concept. But, in the last few years I found myself coming back, looking at landscape and nature in a new way. Through the lenses of the art I have been creating, I have seen how I can apply my technique of multi-patterns and repetition to the shapes and forms I encounter in nature. My piece "Let there BEE Windmills" was inspired by driving for hours across Iowa where there are hundreds of windmills in the distance and wide open spaces. I wanted to play with pattern and texture on each hill and try to replicate that ongoing expanse of land.

Another intriguing question that Beth asked is "How do I know when an idea is good?" To me this is a strong gut feeling that I can't ignore. I just know I have to make it. Most of the time I can't quite imagine the whole piece or how it will all come together. There is a feeling of challenge and of the unknown. I often have basic ideas in my head for many months before I get to make them. But sometimes an idea is sparked by something I see or think of and I am compelled to make that piece right away. Rarely do I start a piece and not feel like finishing it. Most pieces I have started are worked on until done because I am so compelled to know what is going to happen next—like watching an exciting movie or reading a compelling novel.

Sometimes I do have to pick and choose which idea I get to work on first. Most of the time this problem is deadline dependent. It's not a very romantic concept, but deadlines are essential for artists. I am very self motivated because I let deadlines push me. If I have a show at a gallery coming up, I know I need to finish a certain number of pieces of a specific size. This gives me the incentive (or excuse depending on how you look at it) to get art finished. Or sometimes I have orders for particular pieces, which will push me to make those pieces first. Art fair season always keeps me motivated because whatever I sell out of the week before is top on the list to make the next week. UNLESS I am totally tired of making that particular type of work; then, no matter how popular it is, if I am no longer excited and inspired by an idea, I move on to something else.

I often think of my brain as a big mixing pot that I keep throwing things into, never knowing how it will all come out in the end. With some of my pieces I can really pinpoint the exact way that I came up with an idea for it. For instance, "Are There are Doorways in the Waterfalls?" is one that was inspired by a Japanese print of a waterfall. I drew my own version of it in colored pencil and then transferred it into a polymer clay wall piece. I also remember that when I was almost done with it, I went to see the movie "The Grand Budapest Hotel," which inspired me to put a gondola in it.

Detail of "Are there Doorways in the Waterfall?"

I've also come up with some easy methods to get the juices flowing. One of my favorite art series is called "Scribble Scapes" which started with actual scribbles left in my sketchbook by my nephew. Later, when I doodled on those pages, I let my mind just grab at whatever floated up, filling in the spaces in a sort of meditative way that left me wondering where all these new ideas came from. I use this same open mindedness when I am creating with my clay. At times I will just bring out a pile of scraps, basically doodling in 3-D with the clay. Last fall I had a lot going on in my life; I really needed some meditative, creative time. So I made multiple mandalas (doodling) that became part of "Color Overload," below.

Beth's final question to me was "What advice do I have for artists?" or "What words of wisdom do I have to give?" I think a lot of times people think there is a trick to being creative, that only artists can use, but I really believe that anyone can become more creative. Frequently it's a case of not trying too hard or trying to force something. If I ever feel like I have to try really hard to think of something, like a title for a piece, I usually can't do it. It's better for me to just let it stew in my mind and wait for the idea to percolate to the surface in it's own time. In the meantime I just let my mind go and play. Something always pops up, eventually.

Musing on Museums / December 21, 2016 by Layl McDill

A few weeks ago my husband and I rediscovered a wonderful place- the public library. It was amazing how that feeling of endless wonderment came rushing back upon walking through the stacks of books. When I walked by the comics section, with the big books about comic strips of the past, I was transported back to being twelve, when I was first allowed to go to the library on my own and check out whatever I wanted. Back then, there were books about fairies and books about games and even books about names in the stacks that I carted home.

On this trip to the library I leafed through many art books, soaking up inspiration. I ended up checking out just one book: “Art and Artifact, the Museum as Medium” by James Putnam. It's a fascinating look at the relationship between art and museums, including art that is made about museums, criticizing museums and even using the museum’s pieces as parts to make new pieces of art.

I really connected with the concepts and ideas in this book because my love for museums goes back to early childhood, to one of the most over powering feelings of wonderment that I can still remember. We were on our trip to Yellowstone and had stopped off at a museum in Cody, Wyoming. In a large section of the museum there were thousands of beautiful and unique arrowheads laid out, row after row. I still can’t quite explain the rush that I felt, viewing all those arrowheads.

There are several pieces in “Art and Artifact, The Museum as Medium” that evoke that same feeling. One is a cupboard full of taxidermied sparrows, clothed in tiny knitted garments by Annette Messager titled “Boarders at Rest." Another is a table of 16,000 human and animal teeth, by Ann Hamilton. This piece, called “Between Taxomony and Communion,” has an eerie effect due to water dripping onto the table, oxidizing it to a dark, red color.

“Between Taxomony and Communion”by Ann Hamilton — “Between Taxomony and Communion”
by Ann Hamilton

The numerous, fascinating pieces in this book make a person look at the idea of museums in many different ways. One chapter is about artists using the collection in the museum to make strong statements, just by re-arranging the pieces. For instance Fred Wilson’s juxtaposition of slave shackles with fine silverware in his installation titled “Mining the Museum”. There are also interesting stories about how artists have covertly exhibited in museums, like Jeffery Vallance’s reaction to being rejected from many museums; he added his art to the wall sockets in the Los Angeles County Art Museum, without their consent!

This book is a rich collection of fantastic ideas and creative takes on the concept of museums. I am inspired to create more pieces that evoke that feeling of endless possibilities. One of my favorite pieces, created last year, is my “Scribble Museum” which was based on a funky grid drawn in my sketchbook by my nephew who was four at the time. Each section of the grid emulates a “room” in a museum – some more straightforward, like the “bird bones” room, which has drawings of bird skeletons on little shelves. Other sections are more abstract, like the room that is mostly filled with a stairway of bricks – each brick with a design or picture inside.

As I head into a new year of creating, I will be thinking of this book and my love of museums. I don’t have any big trips planned to far away museums next year, but I will certainly visit my local museums to be filled with inspiration. We will see what pieces emerge.

A Day of Doodling at the "Speak Conference" / October 26, 2016 by Layl McDill

One of my favorite things to do is go to a meeting or talk and doodle as I listen. Way back in high school I learned that I could concentrate better when I was drawing and I found that when I studied for tests I could remember my notes much better because I could visual the doodle they were next to. Today I spent the day at the Minnesota Landscape Arboretum at the "Speak! A Kindship of All Creatures" conference with my daughter Elliot.

I was able to attend this conference because I teach through the Nature Based Therapy Program. I have been teaching at such venues as Melrose Eating Disorder Institute and Struther's Parkinson Center for many years. My daughter Elliot was interested in this conference because she is thinking of getting a puppy and training it to be a therapy dog.

Dr. Jean Larson, organized an amazing conference line up. She probably didn't realize that it would provide the fuel for so many sketches as I sat and listened. Dr. Balcombe's talk included some amazing images of fish which made their way to my sketchbook - now when I look at each fish I am reminded of the fascinating story of that fish's special skill or adaptation.

Fish Sketches during Dr. Jonathan Balcombe's talk

I also doodled around loose sketches that I had drawn in pencil a few years ago. These are great structures to hang my patterns on. I'm thinking the one I did today will need to become a "scribble scape" someday soon. When I transform it into clay I feel like I will be reminded of the whole conference all over again. I am sure some of the ideas will seep into the finished piece as I discover more of the truths it will reveal.

Zoe Weil's talk "Becoming a Solutionary" ended with a directed visualization where she asked us to imagine ourselves at the end of our lives talking to a young person about how we made the world a better place. I thought of two things I do right now... one- I pick up every plastic bag I see as I bike from place to place. Not huge but it's got to help a bit. And two I hope to make art that is "subtle activism" a quote that I heard last week at a WARM (Women's Art Resources of MN) event.

My sketchbooks are troves of sparks waiting to ignite into pieces. These particular sparks that started today seem even more filled with fuel because of the setting of their birth.

LAYL McDILL

Story Sculptures of Magic, Wonder and Mystery