Art Bead Scene December Challenge

Paris

Maria Helena Vieira da Silva, 1951

Oil on canvas, 12 7/8 x 18 (33 x 45.5)

Inscribed on stretcher 'A Rex avec toute l'amitié de Vieira' and 'à Vieira'

The inspiration this month was down right sneaky.  A lot of times when I see a piece of art, I immediately start working out a design in my mind.  The painting above didn't generate any strong feelings.  In fact, all I really thought about was how blah it was considering that it was supposed to represent one of the most vibrant cities that I have ever been too.  I then put it out of my mind.  Or so I thought.

I had picked up a polymer link from Staci Louise Smith that was larger and I thought that it would make a great focal.  It's gorgeous with pinks and oranges all playing together so nicely.  Somewhere I had picked up some light pink beads and I had set them and the focal in my handy muffin tin to use later.

Well their time had come since I was sitting at my design table with no real ideas in mind so I grabbed the tin and pulled out the focal.  Still not really sure what I was going to do but I started digging in my stash.  I came up with a leather tassel that would be perfect.  I kept saying that I wanted to use more tassels as I love the look.  No reason to put it off any more.

Now that I had the focal in mind, I needed to decide what to do with the body of necklace.  At first I was going to knot the pink beads with waxed linen but I had been doing a lot of that lately and needed a change.  How about a beaded chain?  That just didn't ring my bells either so I started digging through my chains and came up with a diamond chain that I could take apart for links.

Bingo!  With that one decision, the finished necklace came together in my mind.  At that time, I realized that I had actually been inspired by the colors and the geometric designs in the painting along with the feeling that I experienced in Paris.  Like I said, it was sneaky and I had to go around the long way to come up with this design.