Monthly Archives: August 2018

mixed media, 1” diameter

For a country with an unbelievable number of rules (some spoken, most unspoken) about how to act, where to be, what to eat, what gifts should be given on each occasion and more, India has surprisingly few rules about color.  Here in New England we have a lot of rules, and they definitely extend to color.  My Grandmother always told me no white after Labor Day, houses shouldn’t be bright blue, and each wall should be painted in just one color.  In India the colors are loud, anything goes, and the brighter the better.  This pendant, named ranga, the Hindi word for color, with its hot pink center, gold-colored edge, silver-colored setting and colorful shiny border celebrates the bright loud colors of India and all the joy they express.

1”x2”, glass, ceramic

It’s like the old adage, when life gives you lemons, make lemonade.  There’s always a mixture of smooth and rough.  What can matter most is how all the elements work together and what perspective we have on the whole mix.  In this case there’s a literal frame that holds it all together, making the messy pieces into something coherent.  A combination of amazingly beautiful glass glaze that came from a broken bowl, a few pieces of manufactured glass tile, and some blue slag (a glass by-product of old-time iron production) that I found in the woods near an old factory, this pendant uses teal and blue and an extra-wide frame to harmonize the disparate elements.

Found objects, 1” diameter

My daughter was thinking with me about these pendants last night because she made a beautiful and thought-provoking pendant herself. On one side it has a large group of small beads symbolizing the majority of people in the world who don’t have enough to meet their basic needs.  In a separate section are some medium-sized beads representing the group of people who have just enough, and in one corner a few larger beads represent the small number of people who have everything that they want.  As we talked about health she pointed out that everything is connected. One thing determines another, which in turn determines the next. I think about it as cyclical, with each piece eventually feeding back into the first.  In public health we talk a lot about cycles of poverty, and we know the health implications of wealth and poverty are tremendous.  This pendant continues to explore the idea of wealth and poverty as social determinants of health, sitting at the center of a web of connected elements.  The coin sits solidly at the center, contributing to many aspects of a person’s life, each represented by one of a ring of small triangles connected by metal rods.  These triangles are like arrows, pointing the way forward based on how much wealth is at the center.

1”w x 2”h, glass

Certain colors are calming, others are vibrant and energizing.  I used this pendant to explore the balance in my own life, right now, that creates a sense of well-being.  I found that it’s mostly the calm colors, greens, blues, purples, that form the core of feeling good, but there needs to be a small splash of energy, the yellow, to liven things up.

Stone, glass and beads, 1”x2”

At the cabins in Taconic State Park the days were warm and rainy, and the best part of the day happened at night.  The fireflies that we never see in the city came out, shimmering in the evening light while we sat around the campfire.  It was good to find a few minutes to relax.  This pendant is made from stones and glass in the many shades of dusky green that surrounded the fireflies by our cabin, and uses glass beads to catch the light in a way that mimics the fireflies’ glow.