Fresh Up

I am stocking my shop shelves at 4PM (MOUNTAIN TIME ZONE) today!

I hope to see you there.

I look forward to spending copious amounts of time in the studio this month now that the fire season is over and Robbie is home.  Thank you all for being here and for your everlasting patience.

+Of The West+

Berry Stained Fingertips

Fabricated ferns, cast New Mexico jackrabbit vertebra, satin polished Snake River rock and cobalto calcite druzy (cut with my rock saw and polished on my lapidary wheel — feels good to be using those tools again), one of my SOS nuggets and a trail of soapy finish, natural rubies.  I call this color palate “berry stained fingertips” and I’m sure you find it appropriate!

Organic elation!  The seen, the unseen, the living and the dead and the cycles in-between!

I’m so glad I had one of these in me this week.  I started this fern and bone series over a year ago and each one has been such a joy to create and a beautiful truth to build.

Thank you to Idaho and New Mexico for making this piece possible.  My lands of love.  My inspirations.  My greatest gifts of place.

+OF THE WEST+

Diana Ring

To dwell in the high country and in the sacred woods!

I’ve had this series half-on and half-off the bench for the better part of six months.  With the hunting season fast approaching, I decided to finish this prototype today.  This is the Diana Ring, as in Diana the Huntress (also known as Artemis).  It features a bi-layer design in heavy sterling that depicts a bull elk wreathed by nimbus and a broken arrow.  I’m looking forward to making a few more of these and perfecting the design.

+Diana+

+The Sun+

+The Moon+

+The Hunt+ 

Some things may come and go but I think my inspirations are always going to revolve around these things:

Idaho & New Mexico

Catholicism (more specifically liturgy and icons, more specifically than that —> Mary/Virgin of Guadalupe/doves/flames/hearts)

Antique Mexican Jewelry

1930s – 1960s Native American Jewelry

High Desert Light (high desert everything)

Rivers

Mortality vs Immortality (life and death cycles and energy transference) —>bones —>wildflowers—>ethers

American Country Culture (cowboys and indians, steel guitar, trucks, boots, bandanas, horses, dust, grit, rodeo, love and stars and heartbreak and freedom)

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For years I’ve resisted referring to my jewelry style as “Western” but I think it’s safe to say I make Western jewelry.  When I say it is “Of The West” I am talking about a spirit, not a specific look.  I feel the same about my photography efforts.  I shoot the West, my interests lay in capturing the West, so my pictures are of the West.

I heard an interview with John Denver once and he spoke of how his music is classified as “country” but he has never felt like a country music musician.  Instead, he called his music “western” because he was singing of the people and the land of the West.  That portion of his interview really resonated with me as I feel most of my work could be seen in the same light.  Also, just so we’re clear, I really adore John Denver, I am listening to him on vinyl as I write this and it’s beautiful.

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I found myself with a clear studio bench this week, for the first time in months (maybe years) and I decided to let myself play, to take hours to sketch and draw and fiddle with shapes and forms and to build a few things off the cuff, to not worry too much about perfection and straight lines, rather to allow myself to color outside of the lines and wing it.  The result is some reimagined settings for motifs I’ve been working with for years.  Rustic statement pieces that hold a splash of the mystic.  This is my love for the high deserts of New Mexico and Idaho rising up out of me and a dash of Catholic iconography mixed in with my simple, hayseed heart.

This is:

+Of The West+

 

 

https://www.thenoisyplume.com/blog/2017/08/12/13146/

Variations on the Uplifted Necklace — similar configurations with turquoise instead of chalcedony.  LOVE that guy in the center with the bi-layer concho-esque connector component.  Actually, I loved that concho style piece so much, I made a necklace and ring set.  I don’t know why it’s taken me ELEVEN years at the bench to finally make a matched set of jewelry…

I am planning on updating my shop on August 8 at 1PM (Mountain Time Zone).  I hope to see you there!

https://www.thenoisyplume.com/blog/2017/08/03/13094/