One Sunday as I was walking, I saw a delicate wing on the ground. I find everything on the ground. Money, sea treasures, lost earrings, feathers. It's the tiny and discarded that spur my imagination.
I wanted to see what this small, paper thin wing would look like in metal. I suppose if I were a painter, I would want to see it on canvas. But here I am, using my saw blade as a paint brush.
Drilling holes and piercing them out.
Renoir said, 'Painting isn't daydreaming. It's manual work that has to be done conscientiously.' I believe the same to be true about jewelry, and any craft for that matter. Malcom Gladwel has concluded that it takes 10,000 hours of practice to attain mastery in a field. And so it is no surprise to me as well that many of the Renaissance's great names started off as goldsmiths' apprentices, including Lorenzo Ghiberti, Filippo Brunelleschi and Sandro Botticelli (to learn more, click here).
