Brooch Sketches: Working with Memory

This series began out of a need for balance. Having no access to a studio, I looked through found objects within my home and began arranging lentils and rice to create sketches for brooches. The materials, or ingredients, remind me of my grandmother. Her dishes were always simple and delicious. The memories of her kindness and strength were comforting to think of while composing each piece. As days turned into months, each sketch grew in size and complexity of design. The direction of each element, whether lentil or grain of rice, as it rested in relation to its neighbor, became important and reflected the relationship from my memories.

Brooch Sketch: Lentil VI.

Brooch Sketch: Rice IV.

Brooches: Sense of Place

The small brooch series Sense of Place is larger in scale. They range between five and eight inches in at least one direction, making the work more dramatic on the body. Being in the city influenced the design of the sculptural form surrounding each enamel, reflecting local buildings, architectural structures, and clouds against a skyline. The introduction of powder coating allowed for subtle color to move beyond the frame of the enamel. Within each, details from nature become the focus of the work, surrounded by an organic or geometric structure that acts as a support or housing.

Brooches: Sense of Place I, II, and III

copper, vitreous enamel, sterling silver, powder coat, acrylic

Brooches: A Study in Form & Surface

This current work has been an opportunity to work with a play between repetition and space, coming off the body in a way that is light and delicate in feel. The imagery of each enamel is once again from impressions found within my surroundings. Yet, the environment has changed, and I find myself looking into the sky and along the shoreline of Lake Ontario and Irondequoit Bay. Vermeil, the warmth of gold over sterling silver, is added to contrast the colors used in the small enameled paintings.

Included within the series are Brooches: Tiny Posy, Brooch: Posy, and Brooch: Flectere (Bend).

Brooches: Tiny Posy

sterling silver, gold, vitreous enamel