Wire Wrapping Tutorials and Helpful Hints

I met Aurea on Twitter a few weeks ago and when I checked out her website, I was blown away by her originality of her jewelry – I had to share her designs with everyone!
Aurea’s jewelry business is named The Golden Plague. “Golden Plague is the translation to English of Portuguese words Aurea Praga. I started using this as a general name for my creations with my blog in 2008.”
Aurea tells me, “I live in Portugal, in Porto. At this time I teach drawing classes and I participate in some craft and design market shows. In my free time I try to draw (I wish I could do it more often) for my own amusement and post it in my blog. I’m always looking around for images, music, movies, books. I read a lot in my spare time. It’s a quiet pleasure that can race your heart. I love spending time with my family and friends. They inspire me every day. I have the privilege of being surrounded by interesting people from different areas and we share and support each other’s ideas and exchange opinions whenever we can. I often think of them as my secret intelligence.”
I asked Aurea how she discovered her jewelry design talent. “My link with jewelry was 4 years ago in the first classes I attended. At that time I worked a lot in the computer and I felt the need to get my hands into something more concrete. I found that metal working was the perfect media for my urge to communicate ideas, and they just keep coming.”
“The main material I use is silver. The thing that attracts me the most is that I can make a piece from scratch. The whole process from melting the silver until it’s turned to a completely new object that you had visualized. For the finishing touch I often use oxide or felt and stones to add some color. Recently I took a workshop on Japanese lacquer and in the next couple of weeks I’ll start listing new lacquered pieces on my sites. I’m always looking for new techniques to enrich my work. But I also like to mix different materials, like in my “Second Chances” Series, that is made out of cans and scraps from magazines. It all depends on what the idea asks for to come out.” I cannot WAIT to see the new lacquered pieces. Please be sure to post a comment on the blog with links when you post those!

My favorite….

Aurea has some really great goals for her jewelry. “My main goal is post graduation in Jewelry Design. I’m waiting to know if it will open this year and if it does I’m already in. My background education is on graphic design but in the jewelry area it’s mainly technical and I’m felling the need to improve my project concepts and it will give me a wider range of knowledge in many ways, some historical context, the ability to think where I fit in and to make my way with more certainty.

Another goal is to spread my work internationally. It would be so rewarding to see it travel across the world.

And that may be possible today through the internet. So, one of my goals is to grow online. I’m in DaWanda for about a month and I fell immediately in love with the handmade atmosphere I found in the internet. Every single day I see something that catches my eye. And I’m getting regular feedback on my work. That’s great! I’ve decided to always take some time to learn the new ways to live in it and deal with its new challenges.”

“Well, as I develop my jewelry work, I try to keep myself in a permanent learning process, taking courses and workshops whenever possible. And drawing, I’m doing a series of drawings (whenever I get the time) that I call “Girls are Weird” where I try to transport to images feelings like guilt or pride or even some feelings I can’t find a word to grab it, especially in the particular way women feel it. I’m a woman and I know that sometimes the way I react can look pretty weird. But the creative process has many different shapes and you never know what is coming your way.” I hope you will be sharing your drawings with us, too. I would love to see these – they sound very insightful!
What inspires Aurea? “Freedom inspires me, especially the freedom of being whoever you are with authenticity and wanting to express that to others. Most of my work is based in human emotions. I try to capture them in an image and jewelry is one of the means to do that. When you wear it you express your ideas, your moods and personality. I’m also inspired by this new open world where you get so many, too many information every day and every culture is mixed and blend. It’s a bit scary but most of all it’s amazing.” This is a great answer! I always think “That ring that I made is cool” – for me, everything is cool, self-defining but I never thought of it to the depth that you do. Thank you for sharing these thoughts with us!
Aurea can be found online at:

Golden Plaque Blog

Aurea Praga DaWanda

Aurea Praga Twitter

The Golden Plague Facebook

Thank you, Aurea, for interviewing with me! I look forward to seeing more of your original creations in the future.

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This entry was posted on Monday, October 19th, 2009 at 7:25 pm and is filed under Featured Artisan Monday . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.