1.5″ diameter, found objects
The tiles and pieces of things the I’ve been collecting for art have gotten a bit out of control. Containers and bins and bags are balanced on top of each other, and it’s not easy to find what I need. This pendant uses a beautiful antique-looking (but new) locket to house a collection of my bits and pieces. I like to think that now that they’re stored permanently inside the locket, they never need to be organized again!
1″ x 1″. foil-backed glass
Consider this a one-inch meditation on contrast and balance. Each time I sit down with glass in front of me to make one of these tiny compositions I realize again that one color is nothing without another, and light is nothing without shadow. It’s not just about contrast, but about balance and the way one affects the other. I’ve always loved those optical illusions where the same color is shown surrounded by two different colors and it looks so different each way. I just finished a stained glass window that leaves a tree in the negative space, and this is the same idea. It’s not clear whether the gold or the black is the foreground or the background.
1″ x 2″, found objects
My daughter’s been doing a chalkboard countdown to overnight camp, and after a couple of pandemic-related delays, we finally reached zero! Now the house is only three-quarters full, and the rest of us have started the countdown until she comes home. This pendant combines a clock face and a beaded pendulum representing all the count-downs with three-quarters of a glass tile. The battery in what would be the empty part of the tile square represents all the energy that she carries with her, hopefully to be released in swimming, singing, canoeing and all the other wonderful things that exhaust campers.
.5″ x 2″, found objects
I love words that move between the different parts of my work. “Findings” is one such word. When I’m working on jewelry, findings are the metal pieces that are already manufactured; the wires, hooks, clasps, and jump rings that can make my own creations wearable. And in my anthropology/public health work, findings are the data that we collect and compile through surveys, interviews, and all the other processes that go into research. But in my studio and in my house, findings are the little pieces of things that get lost and then discovered under a chair, between cushions, on the floor near the trash can. This pendant is made of the last type of findings. I think most of these parts (a bit of a necklace, some ball chain, a zipper pull and some washers) were stashed in one of my pockets while I was cleaning. And look how official they can seem when they’re combined!