Blue Bear Beads Blog

Bead Artist in the Spotlight…Sig Wynne Evans

Welcome to a new feature of the Blue Bear Beads Blog. Each week (or more often if possible) I am featuring a bead artist. This segment is on Sig Wynne Evans. Sig is an extremely talented artist who I admired long before we met. She and I share a common love of bears and photo-realistic beadwork. Below are her answers to my “interview” questions.

How did you come to the glamorous world of beads? I stumbled in to the bead world back in 1983. There was a gallery around the corner where I used to live in Saratoga Springs NY that had some amazing beadwork. It was done by a man, which was enough to amaze me at the time, and then how it was displayed against the black background with the lights on it, just sparkled more than anything I had ever seen. Plus the style, very deco looking necklaces with lots of fringe. I wanted to wear one out to the Discos I used to frequent!
There was another shop in Provence Town Mass that inspired me during the same time period. It was a long narrow store with nothing but beadwork. Amazing earrings, necklaces, and something I had not seen since. They had these leg coverings, almost like fishnet stockings, with tassels here and there, and a beaded garter on elastic to hold them up mid thigh. I cant imagine wearing something like that, but I was intrigued.
An aquaintance who lived in my building was fantastic at beadwork, especially bead embroidery. I tried desperately to get her to teach me, even the promise of money never seemed to convince her to make the time, or sober up long enough to teach me. So I gave up asking her, and went to the local bookstore. I looked up “Beads” in their “Books in Print” catalogue. There were perhaps 8 titles on beadwork at the time (can you imagine that!!). One of the was Techniques of Beaded Earrings by Deon Delange. I ordered it sight unseen. When it came in, I could hardly contain myself! It was EXACTLY what I wanted! I was jumping up and down. I am sure the clerk thought I was nuts! I went to the only place I could buy beads (Woolworths) bought a package of all the colors they had, needle and thread, and went home. As they say, the rest is History.

What made you start designing and selling your patterns? I started designing because I got bored with the geometric designs. There are just so many geometrics you can do before you go stark raving mad. It gets DULL really fast.
By this time, I had moved to San Jose, CA. There was an ad in the Sunday paper for a local upscale restaurant. A couple was having dinner and wine. What caught my eye was the stained glass peacock in the background. I was so entranced by it, I wanted to capture that peacock in an earring. So I drew little boxes for beads, got my colored pencils and about an hour later, I designed my first earring. I sold DOZENS of the Peacock Earring at a local beadstore. That encouraged me to create more designs. Which lead me later to sell the designs in booklets, and become published. This first peacock design can be found in Earring Designs By Sig Vol 1 Published by Eagles View Publishing, Utah.

Do you have one piece that you have done that is your favorite (or
current favorite)? I would find it hard to pick a favorite of my beadwork or designs. The peacock will always hold a special place in my heart, because it got me started. I think the most technically difficult was the Race Horse and Jockey, since this piece is 3D based totally on peyote with no internal stuffing. It is totally hollow. The same goes for a necklace I had on exhibit at Celestial Seasonings in Boulder CO. They had a call for entries for art work inspired by their tea boxes. I chose Mint Magic. This was the first piece I ever had accepted into an art exhibit! I was thrilled. They had it for a year. Also, Peepers (on my website) makes me smile every time I see him. He is just so bright and looks like trouble!

Do you have any special plans or goals for the future? To add more to The Cracked Bead. Just to keep working on more projects as I have been, and I have been toying with some other wierd ideas. Don’t know if they will pan out, since I get really wierd ideas at times. Sometimes they work, other times they fall flat on their nose. But thats what makes creating fun, right??

You can find Sig at http://www.beadedbear.com

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