Kerrie Owens Arts

A clients just given a really good idea and to be fair it’s a good one that should have implemented ages ago.
For my regular clients that like buying my higher priced pieces but then struggle to pay for them, but then on top of that the likes of klarna make you uncomfortable? Would some of my regulars that buy a few pieces a year from me like a payment program just for you guys? We arrange a minimum non refundable deposit to put the item on hold, set up weekly or monthly payments via Etsy or shopify, set up a end off payment limit the piece gets shipped to you on the final payment? No interest on payments unless those platform cause me issues with fee hikes at a later date. It means you can shop for the Big C in December a little earlier with less worries? But this will be exclusive to my regulars only. New clients sorry you will head through klarna on either of those platforms for the time being. Let me know what you think and will start sort out my T+C’s.

Get 15% off for the next three weeks in my Etsy store as part of a summer shop clear out. Selected items only.

KerrieOwensArts - Etsy UK Shop The colourful shop of unique little treasures. by KerrieOwensArts located in Rochester, England. Rave reviews! Average review rating is 4.8 or higher

Stationary packs for digital download, ready for you to customise as you please with your chosen font and text, to go to the Printer of choosing and choose the paper stock you prefer, though do talk to you printer on this on they will know and talk you through the best ones to use, but they do look great on a Matt finish as I have already had some A4 prints made with a Matt stock. But downloaded as blanks, choose what ever one fits certain parts of your stationary for your event. You would like a mix and match of different plant colours? Not a problem drop me a message of your chosen images for a personalised bundle and I will set up a custom listing for those images. Imagine a different succulent colour per table, that will look awesome!

Love your succulents? I have loads of new procreate pieces heading for digital download on both Etsy and shopify tomorrow. I’m also working these into wedding and party stationary bundles.

New big oak pieces with copper and shell inlay. I have NZ Pāua, non NZ abalone and mussel shell. Available. Currently working on a large Toki version with Pāua.

My solar flower diffuser is complete, with a magnolia flower, recycled wood, twine, glass test tube and a stone of choice. It’s best hanging from a hook with space for the flower over a nail but I made do. But the sola flowers come in many different designs so it can be changed up. I will have ago at another one later in the week with a coloured rose one.

I found a way to turn some off cut wood pieces into reed diffusers with a little help of some copper wire and a test tube. I have some semicircle ones coming up soon which will include solar flowers as part of the detailing as well. The wood comes from a lathe blanks company based down in the west country, these pieces in particular from making blanks for making bowls. I've so far make two as testers, one with a removable test tube and one with a glued in test tube (the one being tested with oil) However the wood was not labeled when I received them so I cannot identify all of it. Yes those framed posters of succulents are also for sale, as part of my open studios entry.

Bog oak craft weaving needles! I figured it was time to do something a little different and had some off cut bog oak that needed using up. Though if you wanted to turn one of these into a small pendant you can add a silver chain or braided cord to your order.

It's that time of year! It's warm outside so I can crack open the studio windows and turn up the dust extractor to max, which means more ventilation! Yes it's the selenite season, and the first two of that season where finished today with the next batch happening tomorrow. Instead of the sanding pads to do all the work on these ones I went a little old school once I got the shape I wanted and sanded by hand for a change and realised that I prefer it in terms of control and keeping the dust down low, but means there are a few more imperfections than usual. I'm starting with a chunky roimata and a toki piece and the selenite never sticks around for longing my shop so if you find one you love don't leave it too long to make it yours.

Both pop up council commissions done and over and I'm really pleased with the outcome. I can tick may pole off my list of sculptures and crazy projects. Now there is talks of more giant puppets for next year. Thank you every one who made a bottle or paper flower, I saw alot of selfies being taken by the paper flowers install.

There is a reason behind this post, but for the privacy of the family involved and its situation, I'm not going to go into that just yet. But I feel the need to drop this support poster here for whoever may needs it in my local Medway area. And also add in that the Medway talking therapies is a free NHS service with a self referral service (even if it does have a waiting list) for 6 sessions to start with. I have used them myself and Susan was incredibly good and explained so much of why I acted the way I did with behaviours, linked some to childhood responses and broke down my traumas and PTSD post miscarriage to make them easier to approach and work my way through. That darkness may make you think you are alone, in reality you never are, there are so many people, services, organisations and charities out there and ready to help where they can. It's never to late to reach out and ask for help, your being human, never a burden, we all need help at some point.

Happy sweeps every one! Belated blessed Beltane! You will find me in Rochester tomorrow under the nucleus banner instead of my own. I have two pop up community installations that I have been working on that will be on show, one on blue boar car park and one outside the cathedral for the Sunday only. We will be actively extending the cathedral installation throughout the day as an active participation piece as well. So come find me in the castle moat to create your own paper flowers and be part of our flora project.

So I'm on a community sculpture build for the Rochester sweeps festival as one of several charities working on some thing. I got the May pole sculpture with recycled plastics and another for paper flowers showing off what we do as Nucleus with our workshops as well as ones made by the community. It's been good learning some new skills as well as getting to know one of the nucleus office staff members that I've not spent alot of time with before.

Some up cycling is going on in my studio, I have loads of offcuts from a company who make blanks for wood turners. A trunk is never circular but the bowl blanks are, so I’m turning those off cuts into air plant holders. So far I’ve identified oak, walnut and cedar, but still trying to identify a couple of others in the bundle. I’ve made the first two and waiting for the glue to dry that will hold in the copper wire in place and then maybe a bottle neck or bamboo ring to keep the copper away from the air plant if weight allows. Either way I’m experimenting a little bit keeping it rustic but simple.

Some one got a snap of my desk while it was semi clean!… Now that’s a rarity. I didn’t even know this shot existed, wondered why my desk was suddenly floating around Facebook.

We can't wait to see where you make all the magic happen this coming summer. Coming from personal experience, I'm sure a lot of you use Open Studios the same way we do - to give your exhibiting spaces a bit of a facelift before the rest of the year. If you are sharing your studios with us all this year we can't wait to see what you choose to do with your space(s). Don't forget to tag us and use the hashtags

Here we have a small working space inside studio. Artist, Digital illustrator and Jewellery designer.

Photograph taken by Liv Frost (Medway Open Studios 2022)



Image description: Inside the studio of artist Kerrie Owens. A wooden desk covered in shells, stones and jewellery-making equipment. On the wall above the table sit 7 illustrations depicting different sunflowers and plants.

FYI photos like this with loads of lines are not intentional to my page, it’s one of facebooks many new bugs. But it does mean my products are not being seen past any more than two photos, in a personal feed of constant trash, mag gossip and adds . If you see this, it’s a glitch that has yet to be fixed after weeks of this being a thing. And bored of having to edit and repost every thing three times over, so I’m just going to start leaving them.

Experimenting with an added new element. I sussed out how to do pin point inlay. Yes my spiritual folk, in bringing in the copper! One roimata has blue kyanite and moldavite with a copper line, the other is just moldavite with copper, the third is the pin point inlay. Apparently copper is ment to inhance the energy of what ever stone or spiritual element your using….Yeah I put it with moldavite … the chaos stone (glass) 😂. I’ve had Moldavite in my own personal taliman for about 6 months now, for me the chaos I’ve received has been very normal for a creative self employed persons chaos so far, I personally don’t think it’s strong enough for me 🤣.

I few new floral themed pieces, returning back to the sunflower designs. To head to gallery exhibit in a few weeks. How ever they are currently listed for sale in advance as I will be working on some more and wood is far quicker to work than stone.

To my amazing followers who live in Medway, would you like to get involved in a project? It will be a great project to entertain the young ones for a day during Easter holidays. It’s one that’s been handed to me to expand upon called the floral project. The point being that I help create an outdoor art instillation using Medway community participation, during the Rochester sweeps festival. What do I need from you? Loads of decorated paper flowers covered in your unique artwork. Templates and tutorials are available on the nucleus website (link below) for peonies, normal flowers, roses and leaves along side the history of the project, it’s inspiration and what’s been done with this project in the past from my predecessors. Bacially you design them, either post them back to me or drop them at the nucleus chatham reception, my job is to then create a curated public gallery/ instillation from them to brighten up the high street for three days. Design them how you please as long as it’s family friendly and non political, it is a family event after all.

https://www.nucleusarts.com/floraproject

Nucleus Arts THE FLORA PROJECT FLORAInspired by the works of Anne PrattWhat is Flora?Flora started as idea - to bring an immersive exhibition in the Halpern Gallery, Chatham, as part of Medway Fun Palace 2023 celebrations. The Flora Project was inspired by the life and works of Anne Pratt, and featured flowers a...

I got talked into it for my 4th year. How ever it will be my 1st year as an individual listing instead of a group. So cleaning up my branding especially for it. Saturday 6th to Sunday 14th July, Saturdays and Sundays only at the moment due to other potential commitments.

Finally managed to do the lashing of a roimata today for the first time thanks to a tutorial with Campbell Carving. Thanks Campbell, it's my much appreciated it took me a while to get my head around the illusion till your video made me realize it's just a macrame half box knot. I've experimented with one of my own pieces to start with but I'm happy enough, once I get a bit more practice that I'm good to take repairs for matau and roimata coned pieces.

Starting the week with jade. NZ pounamu, the same pounamu blended with big oak and Alaskan nephrite. Currently available on both sites.

How this for a glutton of punishment. Me and Laura (Nucleus’s funding office) we have decided we are going for round 20 of arts council development cuz why not right 😂. And to top that off we are going to do the next Quest (Queen Elizabeth scholarship trust) round as well to maybe take me to Tai Poutini for a carving qualification in Greymouth. Eventually some one is going to have to say yet to me.

I would like to say thank you for the support I’ve had in the last couple of days, it’s highly appreciated, from the guys in C-Block allowing me to blare out the older angry 30 seconds to Mars with out complaint and pull out the loud tools to vent, to nucleus giving me an instillation job to cheer me up and to every one dropping me messages,to Anne Taylor giving me the pat on the back (hey the woman is a nucleus legend). And to Laura Pike for helping me with the original paperwork, for keeping my brain on track, keeping those little daemons of imposter syndrome at bay and going deeper into how I think and work. I dont don’t do well with formal paperwork and she was amazing to step in a help me in that area. I know this was just as exciting a step for you as it was for me, especially all the Polynesian talk . This woman was amazing and more artists in Medway should go to her for funding help, she knows her stuff. Once I’ve had a few days mental break, let’s be a total glutton for punishment and do it all over again for either round 20 or the Quest scholarship.

Starting to make use of the smaller wood pieces in my studio, they are being turned into ID styled bracelets with an adjustable box knot closure. I've started with left over yew but I do have some NZ Rimu and British Oak to work with as well. These can be available to have Norse or witch runes added in as well for added detailing.

www.kerrieowensarts.co.uk

After some time topping up on the shop, restocking from Christmas and getting loads of the basic shapes done (in-between some fun bog oak experimenting of course) I can now start on the fun statement pieces again and spend some time doing more detailed pieces. That's the thing with being a crafter, you do your bread and butter pieces that pay the bills and then follow with the really fun stuff. So starting with a maple wood goddess with a koru , she has a Moldavite inlay in her back so it remains hidden away for those wanting to do the "spiritual Moldavite journey" to see if it actually works... but does not want any one else knowing your doing it (see I got you). The second a birch wood puffy heart with koru detail to one side. The koru is representing the new front curl of a fern leaf, it represents new life, new pathways and new journeys as well as being part of the famous Fibonacci sequence of nature.

Both are available on Etsy and on my webpage.

www.kerrieowensarts.co.uk

Thank you Mountain Jade, it will be an honour to help repair your Tonga in the UK. I'm happy to take up the role for you. I best start learning how to do some of the other lashings other than just the hei toki. I like a challenge.

Also as a plus I've just been assigned the May Pole installation for the Rochester sweeps festival now I'm going to be remaining in the UK for the Beltane season. I will be extending on the Nucleus Flora project for this festival recycling plastic bottles into flowers.

So I found out my fate with the arts council development grant yesterday, which resulted in me being unfortunately unsuccessful. Only 1 lapidary carver was chosen in 436 chosen awards, with project title of “gem cutting using artificial intelligence.”… I don’t know how the hell I compete with that. My application was to go into a mentor program with Māori carvers in NZ to delve deeper into Māori culture and carving practices and I had a mentorship lined up with Sands studio in Hamilton. I’m gutted I will admit, it’s a bit a kick in the teeth and I wish I had a more worthy opponent over an A.I experimentalist (it sounds petty I am aware, I don’t mean it to be, but it’s taken me years to get where I’m at by hand and Dremel), which is already highly controversial in the arts industry as it is. To the 6 larger (non lapidary) sculptors given awards all of which looked as through they were taking traditional routes, well done and congratulations, I wish all of you well on your learning journeys, especially the architect, your title intrigued and that’s a huge leap to take.

I just wasn’t prepared for A.I being an issue in the stone carving world so soon, I thought that it might have been a year or more before it was. I knew it was already used in the wood engraving world, so knew it was a matter of time. But I can’t compete with that, or adapt around it either, I would not even know how to and it’s a little scary for me.

For now though I have some emotions to work through and time to decompress is needed. Being stuck in that grant limbo since November, it does take it toll on your energy levels and your brain power and it’s now caught up with me.

I was walking down chatham high street after picking up tea from the polish mini mart a couple of weeks ago. I saw this guy with a simple black and white doodle on his T-shirt and thought it was awesome and wondered what it would look like if I used my colouring book pages on a T-shirt….. I freaking love them. On my website only, also available as a hoodie or a sweatshirt.

https://kerrieowensarts.co.uk/collections/t-shirts