What’s New

1/2″x 2″, found  objects

Thank goodness for my elementary school unit on simple machines. I’m not sure I needed to know what levers and inclined planes were called, but I did need to know that I wasn’t crazy when I found that using them made life (and building things) a whole lot easier. Consider this pendant an ode to the simple machine-in this case the threads on a screw- and to all the cool things that you can build with them.

1″ diameter, found objects

When I think about the word “surrounded”, I jump immediately to the claustrophobic idea of being in a crowd, chased, ringed.  But it’s nice to be surrounded by people when they’re there to help and to comfort.  I love a friendly crowd, and I definitely miss being surrounded by coworkers and the happy chatter of an office.  The chain that rings the watch gear in this pendant is a supportive chain, surrounding it to keep it safe and stable.

1″ x 1″,  found objects

We’ve been packing and unpacking suitcases and backpacks and snack bags and washing machines and dryers as we traveled and returned from our trip.  Every time I pack I think of my grandmother and her very specific rules about how and where each thing should go, and her amazing ability to fit a whole lot of everything into the refrigerator.  I aspire to be a packer like her someday, but I’m afraid that even with all my traveling, I’ll never practice enough to get to her level.  

1″ diameter, found objects

Last week it was moon, and this week it’s SUN! Even though I’ve been working on changing my mindset about winter, I still choose the warm, bright, happy-making sun of the Caribbean over the snow and slush of New England.  

1″ diameter, watch parts

The end of the year makes me think back on what’s happened in the past 12 months. And what strikes me is never the specific events, but the fact that everything’s followed the same pattern that it did every other year. regardless of travel, job changes, growing children, the year follows its own rhythm. Like the moon rolling through its phases, the years’ pattern unfolds again and again. I like this watch mechanism because it still spins, giving me a tiny sense of control, as if I could change or reverse the phases of the moon. 

1″x1″, found objects and filati

We passed some kind of milestone recently.  My 10 year-old son and I decided that our relationship has changed from being parasitic to symbiotic.  I think the change has been gradual, from in utero to now, but there have definitely been many moments along the way when it’s been unbalanced, to say the least.  And now I can confidently say that as far as joy and love (maybe not household chores yet) we’re even.

1″x1″, found objects

I have a lot to feel grateful for this year, and I like the idea of wearing a little reminder of that around my neck.  I was also thinking about what a penny can buy, and remembering “penny-a-pound” dinners at the Ground Round.  Each of us kids would step onto the tall scale, and whatever we weighed was how much we paid for our dinner.  As a kid who was small for my age, I was lucky even then!

1″ diameter, found objects

When you scratch the surface you see reality and history peeking through.

1″x1″, found objects

I feel my collecting (read:hoarding) impulses kicking in.  Because the future is insecure, it’s hard to know exactly what will be useful and what won’t.  What kind of scarcity will come first?  And will there be an object that might help?  Or will it be the people around us that really matter.  Luckily, much of what I collect is tiny, so I can indulge my impulses for a while.

1″ x 1.5″, found objects

It’s not the good kind of slide.  No, this time it’s a slide down a slippery slope toward a future that’s looking deeply disturbing.  But after a day of reflection I was able to put a bit of shine deep inside. Maybe there’s a bit of hope somewhere.

1″ x 1″, found objects

I’ve been working on a piece of glass that shows hills and valleys that will cover the bottom section of a window, masking the view of roads and buildings and offering a more serene view.  But the hills themselves in my glass windows are busy,  with lumps and bumps and spikes, and in real life they’re even more rugged.  The further away you go, the smoother and more serene they look.  This pendant, made from pieces of a copper planter, has a hilly section on the right and a valley in the middle, with a nice, flat walkable area on the left.  

.5″ x 2″, glass

I don’t usually have the patience to do a color study before I make a larger piece.  But these tiny pendants work as color studies, just like the more thematic pendants can serve as little maquettes for larger mosaic compositions.  Although my tendency is to jump into huge projects with little to no planning  (as long as no one is paying for the project), I’ve started to like these small scale tests and practice runs.

.5″ x 2″, glass

How I wish it were the season when flowers were blooming instead of wilting and withering! I put together a pendant made from hand-pulled cane to bring a few of spring’s colors with me into the winter months.

1” x 1.5”, glass

When I was in High School I was art editor for the student art and lit magazine. I ran weekly critiques where we looked at submissions and then voted on whether to publish them.  In my memory, the critiques were actually quite respectful and thoughtful.  We thought about contrast, design, message, and applied all the art concepts we were learning in art class.  The one that feels most relevant today is “too busy”.  It’s easy to fill a canvas or a piece of paper with too much. You lose the subject and the noise wins.  And this, my pendant for the week, is an ode to “too busy”, in art and in life.

1″ x 1.5″, beads and found objects

If someone says that something is  “cookie cutter” it’s not usually a good thing.  It’s generic, just like all the rest. But for me, cookie cutters have only positive connotations. Anything that helps me bring more cookies into the world is a friend of mine!  As soon as I added the eyes from a set of hooks and eyes to the little silver triangles in the pendant it looked too much like cookie cutters for me to think about anything else. And then, of course, the beads became sprinkles.  

1″ x .75″, found objects

A friend invited me to a bodypump class at a local gym 6:00 AM this week. That’s pretty much the antithesis of anything I would ever do.  I’ve only stepped into a gym when coerced, I get all the sleep I can these days, and the term ‘bodypump’ scares me silly.  For a variety of reasons that were only partly my fault, I didn’t go to the class, but it got me thinking about pushing my limits in other realms.  I decided to take a flameworking class that’s probably well beyond my skill set, I’m applying for some projects that are long shots, and while it may not seem like much of a push, this pendant is yellow.  Yellow!  I never use yellow.

1″ x 1″, found objects

Can you tell what’s in the middle of this pendant?  It’s a decorative paper clip.  If I look at it as a tiny maze that resembles what I try to make it through each day,  it’s a good reminder that all of the obstacles, all of the twists and turns actually take me on a path that holds things together. Sometimes it’s hard to tell whether I’m on my way into a stuck center or out to the exit, but either way, each turn gets me closer.

1″x1″glass and found objects

Technically. this isn’t my best work.  It’s messy on the edges, and the arrangement doesn’t have the grace and consistency that I try to create.  But it’s like a quick glance inside my head these days: all the tools are there, and there are flashes of brilliance, but everything’s just a bit stuck in the mud, and I have to work hard to pull each piece up and out so that it’s not buried anymore.

1″ x 1.5″, found objects

I love the idea of copper nails because copper is so soft, you’d have to be more concerned about beauty than strength to choose them.  And beauty they have, with a want glow and a patina as they age.  But these copper nails could be combined with the pin back at the bottom of the pendant to create a strong connection, if only for fabric, without depending on the strength of the metal.

1″ x .75″,  found objects
I’m horrified to see that the days are already getting shorter, and school starting yesterday gave me clear proof that fall is here.  The cold is tough, and the flowers drying out is rough, but the part of fall that really gets to me is losing the light.  As the evenings fade and then the afternoons fade too, I fall into a funk.  This pendant includes a glow-in-the-dark watch hand, which I hope will stretch the glow of daytime for a few extra hours into the fading fall nights.

1″ x 1″, found objects

Wouldn’t it be cool to have wings?  I think most people imagine soaring above the earth, watching the world go by, but for me they’d just be practical.  I’d be able to skip the traffic, zoom from one place to another, manage all the pick-ups and drop-offs and meetings and workshops with no sweat.  I’d struggle in the winter, what with the cold and the snow, but I think I’d still give them a try.

1″x1.5″, glass and found objects

I’ve been on Cape Cod all week, waking up to the sounds and colors of the ocean, and hearing the calls of seagulls all day.  Although teaching a mosaic class has stopped me from spending full days at the beach, it’s been a beach-filled week, and I’m sad to see it ending.

.5″ x 2″, found objects

There was a mural in Allston when I was growing up  that I absolutely loved.  In fact, I think it’s still there. Though faded now, it shows windows on a large brick wall, and through each window you can see a scene inside.  Cats, people, couches… there’s another similar mural on Newbury street with portraits of stars in the windows.  And in both cases, the windows are false or boarded up.  It’s just an imagined life inside.  Here in the US, unlike in the Netherlands, shades are drawn as soon as it gets dark, and you have to imagine what’s happening inside other people’s homes.  This pendant shows empty windows, ready for you to project your imagined reality, and a central window glowing with bright amber light.

1″ x 1″, found objects

I’ve made more than one design called “organization” because it’s a constant process, but this one is “organized”.  It’s the dream.  Small bits of my life and my space are in fact getting organized. I can manage about one square inch a week, so a pendant is just about perfect.