Etspiration Friday - Dianewoodall

Welcome to the second edition of Etspiration, where we go more in depth with one artist.  All of February will be glass Etspirations, and on this second week we have a fantastically talented lampworker.  Her work has a completely different feel than last week's Lilianabead, but both share the same devotion to their art. 

Dianewoodall puts a bit of herself in each bead, and each bead reflects her love of nature.  I can't tell you how much I enjoyed perusing her large selection, because each new focal bead or set was a feast for the eyes.  The lines, dots, and shapes are all colorfully stunning and all related to nature.  If you've seen my own work, you know that I'm a huge fan of organic elegance and movement, and Dianewoodall is a master (or mistress, I suppose!).  Motion, depth and personality all shine within each piece. 

Her use of Line is phenomenal.  The natural waves, the swirls, and the overall shape of the bead all draw the eye to the endpoints in a relaxed, soft manner.  To break up the lines she's added some focal dots, and they don't clash with the rest of the design but blend harmoniously with it.  This is my favorite bead because of the colors (I never thought of putting these colors together, and if I had I wouldn't have been able to make it look this good!) and the placement of the dots.  In most of her larger pieces she has a section of smaller dots, and I love how she is able to blend them into the rest of the piece.  All of her beads have this same movement within them.  It takes some serious skill to make a whole bunch of lines, swirls, raised dots, and tiny dots to look so good!

I'm a fan of non-red-or-pink hearts, and this one is simply delicious.  Again, her use of line is masterly, drawing the eye towards the points in a subtle manner.  She's placed the focal flowers in just the right places, and hasn't added so many that the piece looks overworked.  The little swirl at the bottom tip of the heart adds a fun, sweet bit of character to the bead. 

I am so curious as to how she manages to make such perfect tiger beads!  These would look so great with any outfit, and animal prints are always in vogue.  Her sets of beads are great because she gives you not only plenty of focal beads, but also the little spacers that will finish off a piece.  And her prices are incredibly reasonable considering the quality and amount. 

I saw this and at first couldn't tell if it was real or glass!  I'm stunned by the realistic look of her shell beads, and if I were you I would definitely invest in her tutorials on this.  The colors of the shells are so natural, the swirls look identical to the real thing, and even the inner bit is darker like in real life.  The background of real sand just takes it to a whole new level; the photography is spot-on.

This set, to me, exemplifies her command of colors the best.  She has an innate ability to put together sets of colors that play off each other to produce a harmonious whole.  In this set the different greens are just different enough that each stands out, and the background color and black dots break up the potential monotony of the greens.  The raised dot adds another focal spot for the eye, reducing what might have been too much green-ness for one bead.  And she used Celadon, which is a color that I've been wanting to try, and definitely will now!

Her shop is filled with items like these, and all her pieces stem from the same inspirational source; you can tell that the same artist created them all.  I like this, when an artist's body of work is cohesive.  It gives the buyer a sense of stability and reassurance that future work will maintain that quality.  It will attract loyal customers, because they know that each new season or set will have that same quality or spark that they fell in love with the first time.

The overall feel to her site is friendly, open and professional.  She has a lovely biography that is welcoming and informative, and all of her descriptions and banner paragraph reflect that same personality.  A customer feels at home, comfortable.  I believe that when an artist creates work that is an honest expression of herself, it can be felt in the art.  Dianewoodall does just this.  Thank you for sharing your talent with us!