Pop or Protect

I so enjoy attending the East Carolina University Material Topics Symposium.  Every January for the last seven years I look forward to getting out of town for a weekend full of lectures, workshops, exhibitions, and connecting with friends.  The entire experience is great, and it is student run, to boot!

A favorite event during the symposium is the charm and pin swap.  I will admit, some years I have been lazy in my submission, giving away a nicely finished sample or something rather simple.  This year, I was inspired to construct a small brooch.  For other swaps I have created small, circular brass brooches with frame like windows that expose a tactile material like cotton or sandpaper.  This was my starting point.

Perhaps bubble wrap, always at my fingertips during work days when I pack and unpack jewelry and other items, was in the back of my mind.  Small bubbles seemed best, right?  The temptation to pop one and then another.  The potential to leave someone unsatisfied at not having their fill of popped bubbles?  But how could I forget about the big bubbles?!  When I fitted one big bubble through the frame of the brooch and test popped it, I was simply delighted!

This was a fun, silly brooch; it was designed to be made quickly, to explore tactile sensations, and to present the option for one specific action.  That action, I anticipated, was to pop the bubble.  I did not expect the wearer's response, or my reaction to it that came nearly a week later.  When I saw my brooch being worn, I introduced myself as the maker and learned, at least for the time being, the bubble was being protected from the maliciously poking fingers of the wearer's friends.

Late the following week, as I was considering this conversation and my intention of creating a fun piece with a simple binary choice, I realized the bubble was imbued with all the usual particulars of any piece I have made.  Because it was made quickly and with the understanding of being given away, I failed to realize these connections.  I had, in fact, thrown caution to the wind and presented an exposed, fragile thing to someone else.  The same feelings of protection and watching over your shoulder so as to guard against outside forces that I have harbored, were instead stirred up in a perfect stranger.

It brings a wry smile to my face, the kind of smile that appears at the corner of my mouth with the slow realization that I've been outsmarted.  What gets me is this: I did it, so easily, to myself.

KLE

Old Experiments, New Thoughts

This little piece has me so excited!  In my last post I wrote about looking for a community of makers and craftspeople.  While visiting Contemporary Craft for Mindful, I expressed this want to a few people who were able to point me in the direction of metalsmiths who teach or make at SCC's studio.  I was happy to accept an invitation to attend a meeting of the very newly formed Allegheny Metals Club.  The particular meeting I was able to attend was a pinswap; how could I resist?!  A swap like this is a great way to meet people in my field, introduce myself and the work I make, and is the best way for me to make something (relatively) quickly.  Another jump-start project was in order!  I had some ideas swirling around in my brain that I hadn't yet gotten out on paper, let alone in metal.

Those ideas started forming a few months ago when I was given a small gold ring to use for scrap because of a broken prong and missing stone.  There was something about the empty oval setting and the three remaining prongs that I found very intriguing.  I began to think about empty spaces within a jewelry context, their ambiguity, and their potential.  Is there a part missing, or is that space a placeholder?  Could the space eventually be filled, and for how long will it remain empty?  When paired with another element, I imagine these questions as a conversation, and I especially think of the question, "Is this seat taken?"

What could I pair with an empty seat to evoke the questions I had in my mind?  When I started looking through potential objects, I came across some experimental enameled tiles I made a few years ago.  Although the experiments, silver knots embedded in opaque enamel, never evolved past their sample-like nature, I never completely forgot them.  When I considered the questions I was asking, the enameled knot samples mirrored by an empty setting fit the bill.

The things that have me so excited are a handful of never-would-haves.  I never would have come to this composition when I first made the enamels, which in itself feels like an accomplishment that has been a long time coming.  There's a feeling I wanted expressed, but it needed a few years to be realized a bit more accurately.  I am satisfied with this in part because I never would have used that setting for anything, and the decision to do that comes from thoughts and questions spurred by the little gold ring.  Finally, I never would have parted so easily with something I felt so good about.  However, I was making quickly and with the intention not to keep; I didn't have the opportunity to become attached, as I so often do with my work.  The makings of successful endeavors on all fronts, I think!

KLE

The Story of Wishing

This brooch is called Wishing. After writing some thoughts about brooches in Why Brooches? I wanted to provide a bit of insight to this piece. It is the image you see on this website and, after all, it is a piece that contributed to the development of the brooches and objects I would make next.

In the summer of 2013 I made this brooch for my sister. It was a celebratory piece. She had just earned her MFA in poetry and would soon be moving to Boston. At that point in time, I was preparing to enter into my last year of graduate school and was, after two years, still struggling to fine tune the aesthetics of my making. But it was summer and I didn't have to worry about editing artist statements or meeting critique deadlines. I was just making, alone in the stuffy studio with the lights off. What I made was large and wearable, a piece that would call attention to itself and to the wearer.

Large, wearable, and attention grabbing had never been intentions with which I ever set out. Of course, large to me at that point in time was barely over an inch and fifteen sixteenths. However, in letting this piece breathe, by making this world just a bit larger, I began to see how those who handled it remained curious about and engaged with it. What followed was a study in form, color, and texture through the format of brooches. I was able to take what I learned in making those brooches and translate it, even if I did compress it, into my objects.

As to the title, well, I had been introduced to Neko Case's Blacklisted ten years late. But I fell hard for her music and listened to that album almost non-stop. I Wish I Was The Moon, as well as Hard Way Home by Brandi Carlile, were at the top of my playlist. Between the songs I was listening to and the observations of those who saw the brooch often comparing it to the moon, my thoughts gravitated toward the curiosity and wonder surrounding the unknown, the anticipation of meeting it, and even the wanting and wishing for it.

KLE

Why Brooches?

Rings flash when we move our hands and earrings sway as we move our heads. Both draw attention and become part, become extensions of our bodies. Wearing a brooch is a bit subtler, I think, and a bit more involved than feeling cool metal slipping over your finger, warming to your body. The mechanism of the pin back provides a process or a ritual. It provides the performance of specific actions required to attach a brooch to clothing, that clothing which is as much a part of the body and the self as skin. There is something grounding, solid, and satisfying about a brooch with a well-made pin back. It is the knowledge that, unless otherwise designed to do so, it will not move, but will nonetheless call attention in its own distinct way. With this in mind, I make my brooches, my small worlds, hoping they will be discovered through eyes, hands, and bodies other than my own.

Above is a short statement I wrote on brooches that I wanted to share.  Honestly, until I was asked to submit to the pop-up version of #ThisIsABrooch, which is part of Adorned Spaces at this year's Society of North American Goldsmiths conference, I had not thought about why I make brooches.  However, I was asked to write a statement answering that very question in 200 words as part of my submission.  Well, I do love a writing challenge, especially when its focus is to draw out the answers to "why?"  It's a good start, that little brooch blurb, and I'm sure I will have more thoughts on it in the future.

As for the present, my thoughts are with the metalsmiths and brooch lovers at the SNAG conference in Boston, especially my UMass alumnae and friends who have put a lot of planning into the conference.  I wish I could be there to see you all, but this weekend is also the start of a summer filled with the wedding celebrations of three lovely ladies!  First up, a bridal shower for my little sister!

KLE

What Are You Thinking? Project Update

Tonight was the opening reception for the University of Massachusetts Artisanry Alumni show, What Are You Thinking?  Although there were only a few in attendance, it was great to have my work in the company of so many talented artists, and see some of the things they've been working on.

Above is the piece I made, 'Wobbly.'  A small brooch, only about 2 x 2", 'Wobbly' is the first piece I made after graduating.  I have a few more of those wobbly, moon-like rings, so this could be the start of a small series!  It felt so good to make this little piece and I look forward to more post-graduate making.

KLE

#ThisIsABrooch Online Exhibition

It's here, it's here!  I was so excited to check out the online exhibition for #ThisIsABrooch.

For weeks I, and so many other participants, have been digging out our favorite brooches, taking photos of them, and posting the images to Instagram with the hashtag #ThisIsABrooch.  The exhibition categorizes the brooches into Hand Made and Factory Made.

I am happy to say a few of my brooches were accepted!  The Snake Charmer brooch was misclassified as factory made and was therefore replaced with the lovebirds:

Check it out!

KLE

#thisisabrooch

May, June and July were a bit of a whirlwind!  Finishing up at school, moving out of the school's studio and teaching a mini workshop for middle school students were a few of the events happening in that time...whew!  The mini workshop got me thinking about quite a few things, and I hope to share those reflections soon.

Leaving the Star Store and its fantastic metals studio behind has not been easy.  Fortunately, Ms. Émilie Mulcahey has occupied my lack of studio with a bit of fun in #thisisabrooch.

From the project's tumbler: "For those "in the know", brooches are often relegated to grandmother's jewelry boxes and exist mainly as golden plastic elephants and rhinestone pieces of fruit. While art jewelers know and love brooches, they often only put out special occasion pieces that aren't worn regularly and don't make it onto the radar for your average accessory consumer. We are looking to change that. We want to see brooches worn every day in every way.  . . .  #ThisIsABrooch is activist wearing - making the conscious decision to include a brooch in your everyday outfit to inspire others to do the same."

"Activist wearing."  I quite like that.  And I have enjoyed participating as much as I love both making and wearing brooches.  You can participate through September 7 using the hashtag, #thisisabrooch, on Instagram.  #thisisabrooch will be curated into an online exhibition and exhibition in print.

KLE

Welcome to the Sideshow

Fellow graduate student, artist, and friend of mine, Chase Stevens of Raven Tooth Gallery, put together a little show called Welcome to the Sideshow.  I happily accepted the invitation to participate in this show as one of thirty artists.

With the MFA Thesis Show installed, defense of my work...defended, and my thesis finished (except for acknowledgements), I could finally work on my sideshow assignment - The Snake Charmer!  Sepia toned photographs of barely clothed, snake wrapped women had been on my brain for a few days when I sat down at my bench to make this brooch.

There was just enough time for a quick snapshot before packaging it up and handing it off to Mr. Stevens to be installed at Guts'n Glory Ink in Rosendale, NY.  And so, a thank you goes out to Chase for the opportunity to be a part of such a great show!

Now for the rest of those acknowledgements...

KLE