Embossing Metal:: Templates and Beginner Techniques

by Mary Jane Miller, Sara Wasserman (Editor), Mary Meade (Photographer)

Historically, the many well-known icons of the Virgin Mary included hand tooled pewter and silver halos. For iconographers today, painting saints with halos embellished in pewter is still a thriving art form in many countries, especially in Mexico. Inspired Byzantine iconographers use metal foil for embossing pewter, chasing and engraving to accent sacred art. Valentin Gomez and Mary Jane Miller's new book Embossing Metal: Templates and Beginner Techniques for tooling metal foil pewter is an essential resource. Russian and Greek iconography employ countless elaborate design styles. We offer the book as guidance, it is a collection of icon templates for those devoted to traditional fine craftsmanship. Beautifully embellished halos have been a Byzantine iconographical legacy and tradition for centuries. This book is geared towards those of you in the iconography community interested in creating your own silver halos. The first section of the book discusses tools, supplies and technique. Tools and metal foil sheets are all you need to create beautiful designs. Each tool has its own character and purpose to help you press from the back to the front and flatten raised areas that get distorted. As you learn to refine the edges of your patterns, you will add a few more tools to accommodate increased skill. This book gives you a place to begin and inspires you to go further with practice. After describing the tools and supplies, I give you basic techniques, step-by-step, to teach yourself how to create borders and halos to embellish your icons. The process is simple, and only requires investing hours of focused practice. After about ten hours of practice, you will begin to sense and feel the amount of pressure required to make fluid designs and texture. Experimenting will bring the best results and in no time you will be skilled enough to create beautiful work for embellishing your icons.

53 pages, Kindle Edition

Published December 21, 2020

About the author

I have a mind full of classic and contemporary icon images, journals filled with words and concepts, it represents a cacophony of fragments brought together with the help of an editor.

I have used Lulu.com for self publishing and then of course Amazon to publish. Mostly this direction is the result of publishing full color books. Publishers are not willing to take a risk because of the expense. Up until now, I have been offering my words and images to a nitch market. The dedication and commitment for Iconography and prayer, comes from my heart and mind.

Getting up at night and writing or painting an idea down is delight. It is common for most artists to work alone fro long periods of time. In the middle of a the inspiration and work we fine out it is not always the middle, creative things happen, we let go of one direction, and wonder off the landscape of the initial outline. My advice is be faithful to your heart.

The latest book In Light of Women is about the absence of women in iconography, and their silent voices in the Christian church. The book includes the images from my latest collection of original icons. They have been a delight to see in print.

Reviews

[Elita Sica · Rating 5 out of 5]

Simple and direct explanation with step by step instructions on how to do estaño, hand tooled pewter. I would recommend it as a complement to an actual class, online or in person. If you are completely new to the technique the samples are inspirational but more than I can imagine as a beginner. A great resource for beginners.

[Mary Miller · Rating 5 out of 5]

Resources like How to Books are great additions to our creative spirits, this one on Embossing Metal is packed with help and guidance.