vblog

The Art of 'OK'

2008-04-25T16:35:00.005-04:00

With the natrual light in the studio somewhat darkened by a few clouds most of the day, I was unable to do what has been on my to-do list for two weeks: photograph new work for the website. Instead I stole a few moments to draw, curled up in the seductively beckoning new cushions on my grandmother's relatively ancient porch swing.

We're just a week or so past the time of year when all of Atlanta looks like a three dimensional Monet painting, daubed with dusky tones of creams, mauves, and lavenders in the form of blooming honeysuckle, dogwoods, azaleas, and wisteria on top of the emerging greens that have now come to dominate the landscape once more. After months of gnarled naked trees that make my soul long for lushness, it's funny that what I should choose to draw was merely the tangle of branches high up in the trees at the end of my back yard without their covering of leaves. Perhaps they are simply easier to draw that way, or perhaps I am just a complete geek armed with a pin-point sharpened drafting pencil, and shading dramatic tones of dark and light graphite until a shape pops off the page is my idea of a good time.

Moments like those in my jam packed life are stolen guiltily yet with determination from my oh so disciplined psyche, surrounded with too much work, the constant call of "Mommy!" and a house that is perpetually in a state of reorganization and decorating (not all that clean and with no room fully painted after 9-1/2 years of living here). Skyler was at one with his electronic inventor's kit, so I could actually listen to the sounds of flapping wings, bird calls, a lady across the side street ranting about her job, and a seriously mammoth sounding frog somewhere around my pond, the sounds of inner city nature.

All was serene until I started writing, and Skyler came proudly running in the studio with his newly constructed AM radio. "Wow, okay!" I said, "great job!!!" It even had a volume control. That child, however, does not. He's a talking, building, drawing, writing, navigating whirlwind, every action done with maximum velocity and determination. He also believes that every single statement, question, command, or general bit of small talk uttered by an adult is ample reason to flaunt his negotiations skills, which are nothing less than exhausting to engage. I remember that tiny fighting preemie in the NICU and tell myself his start in life imprinted as surely as a baby chick's first seeing its mama, and I remind myself of my mantra: If he's okay, then everything is okay.

In the face of such constant arguing (or contradiction) I have learned the hard way how to appear agreeable for my mental health and stability. It's fun to watch my partner beginning to learn these essential skills of parenting, the first of which is the necessity of the response, "okay." "Okay" is the ultimate survival tool in a parent's arsenal of a mental toolbox. I'm not talking about little Johnny running rampant in a restaurant while his parent(s) blithely ignore(s) his antics and pretend that everything is okey-dokey. I'm referring to soliloquies constantly projected from the back seat that proclaim things like which shortcut we should take through traffic and how we can't possibly go to parkday a week from Friday because The Weather Channel has predicted slight scattered showers in its long range forecast. To survive with the last shred of one's sanity intact, the adult's response should never be, "Well, that's a long way away, and The Weather Channel might change their forecast as the day gets closer." No, the only correct response is, "Okay," and then deal with the situation and little Hamlet's possible adjustment to change come the aforementioned Friday morning.

We once got into a months long debate about the traffic signals at the on ramp from Freedom Parkway onto the seven lane occasionally moving disaster of a freeway, known as The Downtown Connector.

"It only operates on Mondays, Wednesdays, Thursdays, and Fridays"

"No, it operates every weekday during peak traffic times."

"No, Mom, you're wrong!"

"Why is that?"

"Because I've seen it operate on those days!"

"So it only operates if you're here to see it?!?"

"Oh, Mom..."

We went through this conversation so many times I began seriously to consider grocery shopping at rush hour on Tuesdays just to show him that I, one of those silly adult type people, who can't possibly know what all an eight year old does, actually knew what I was talking about, but there is no way that such an adventure would do anything at all for my sanity. Finally one Tuesday we got stuck in northbound traffic where he could see the alternating signals in question change to let cars from each lane enter the Connector.

"Mom! It does work on Tuesdays!!!"

"Imagine that."

"No, it really does!!!"

"Okay"

A moment of silence followed before the next subject was gleefully begun from the back seat. I had finally learned. Now when faced with such proclamations as, "When we get home I'm going to build a contraption made of legos, Thomas train track, 2000 dominoes, those cardboard boxes you put in the recycling bin, and marbles all propped up at different heights with 30 video cassettes. It's going to stretch from the kitchen through the dining room and into the den all the way to the front door!" I don't say something stupid like, "I really need you to wait until after we get the junk cleared out of the den and vacuum the rugs." I say, "okay," and know that he'll either forget in the wake of some other endeavor, or, in creative engineering mom mode, I'll help him build it and covertly steer the whole works to one side, making it loop under itself a really cool way that makes him forget how long it was intended to be. Such options only come with the word, 'okay.'

The kinds of flow states achieved with my drafting pencil are far and few between, and I swallow many moments of frustration having to work and take care of business without them, usually remembering at some point to breathe deep and notice that things really are okay. My friend, Beth, once described parenting as being like getting her Jeep Wrangler many years ago. She told me that she was miserable and sore from driving it until she realized that the only way to be in it was to let her body bump and jostle along with the vehicle instead of trying to remain so firmly rigid in the seat the way she would in a sedan with good shock absorbers. When she had kids, she realized that the only way to survive was to bump and jostle along with their moods, tantrums, and enthusiasms instead of perpetually feeling put out and sore out that they didn't cruise like a Caddy or a Beemer. We bump and jostle along, and most of the time it's okay.

Composting Good & Evil

2008-04-04T23:34:00.002-04:00

Visit an exhibition you can attend from anywhere! The show, Composting Good & Evil, presented by Ethical Metalsmiths is now online at ethicalmetalsmiths.org

The show premiered last month at the 2008 Society of North American Goldsmiths Conference in Savannah, GA on a giant digital billboard on one of the buildings of Savannah College of Art and Design. I have to admit, seeing my 1-3/4" long pendant on the side of a building was trippy and yielded a different perspective of it than I'd had before.

The organization promotes greater demand for ethically mined and refined metal through understanding and awareness of where we get and how we use these materials.

From their site:
We asked artists "to consider what would happen if we tossed our smug habits into a heap? What would happen if we composted our shameless sins, our saintly intentions and our fertile imaginations and pledged to use the resulting fecund glory to redesign and nurture the world?" We suggested using any of the following words as guides; reflect, reform, reconsider, resolve, relate, revise, rework, renew, repair, repurpose, reconnect, review, regret, renounce, reproach, react, rethink, reuse, reduce and recycle.

Check it out along with the rest of the exhibition. Many of the artist statements are well worth the read as well.

Victoria's Article in Jewelry Artist magazine

2008-03-28T21:11:00.003-04:00

Check you local bookstore for the April 2008 issue of Lapidary Journal: Jewelry Artist magazine. My project article, Strata Charm Bracelet is on page 42 along with my earrings, Turkish Nights, on page 41 of the Contributor's Gallery. Thanks to Editor-in-Chief, Merle White, and Managing Editor, Helen Driggs, for being such great people to work with!

On a less that perfect note, the two-part article solicited by Art Jewelry magazine has been published in the May 2008 issue under the titles The Perfect Stamp Is the One You Make Yourself and Take the Next Step in Bezel Making. Because of their confusing re-writing of the article and the misinformation contained therein, I have made the original material available on my site. Also, I did not write the sidbar, "temper, temper" contained in the stamp making article, nor in 19 years of metalsmithing have I ever sunk to such an unfortunate pun. Click here for my stamp making project. Click here for my stamped step bezel project. By agreement with Art Jewelry, I retain the right to publish the original material.

New Rings DVD Release!!!

2008-03-26T15:22:00.005-04:00

Yes, it's out! Metal Techniques of Bronze Age Masters: Rings was released March 4, 2008 just in time for me to ship out the pre-orders and head off to the Society of North American Goldsmiths Conference in Savannah.

The content of the DVD is based on my Rings workshop, a 2-3 day intensive in which students walk away with between 3 and 6 six rings finished (or nearly so) based on ancient styles but with a contemporary twist and design options of their own. I chose 3 of my favorite styles from this workshop, the intaglio inspired wax seal ring, the drusy ring, and the hidden compartment "poison" ring. Offering the instructions for this set of rings also allowed me to include the techniques of alloying gold, making gold bezel wire, fusing gold/silver bi-metal, roller printing, stamping, and, of course, some really handy bezel tricks for gold or silver bezels.

Post release, I've taken some much needed time off to do really exciting things like my taxes. No time to bask in the glory. I did, however, just discover that my first dvd in the series, Russian Filigree is available at Target.com. Turns out they're powered by Amazon, which is one of my retailers.

Wow, you spend your life promoting one-of-a-kind works of art and railing against mass market consumerism, and, well, end up there anyway. More importantly, there is a map behind my desk with pins covering up large areas of Europe, Asia, South America, and 2/3 of North America to indicate my retail dvd sales. There hasn't been time for me to keep up with adding pins, but I'm thrilled that the series has done so well!

More Canterbury 'Tails'

2008-02-13T11:39:00.007-05:00

I'm still reeling from the Arch Bishop of Canterbury's unbelievably stupid statement last week, concerning Sharia law.

From BBC.co.uk
Dr Rowan Williams told Radio 4's World at One that the UK has to "face up to the fact" that some of its citizens do not relate to the British legal system.

Dr Williams argues that adopting parts of Islamic Sharia law would help maintain social cohesion.

For example, Muslims could choose to have marital disputes or financial matters dealt with in a Sharia court.

He says Muslims should not have to choose between "the stark alternatives of cultural loyalty or state loyalty".

Gosh, I know some American Christians, who don't relate to court system either. Let's just let them work it out in church, shall we? What kind of moron makes these statements?!?

I grew up Episcopalian, and while I no longer subscribe to its rather limited belief system, I've always appreciated its dedication to rationalism (a few fringe charismatic Episcopal churches not included). It can be a little short on profound mysticism, but I've always been eternally grateful to my parents that they didn't inflict their Southern Baptist upbringing on their offspring, so I have a soft spot for the church's use of logic and metaphor, plus I believe its relative lack of deviation from the Anglican Church helps me get more of the jokes on The Vicar of Dibley.

Unfortunately, there is no logic or rationality whatsoever in the Archbishop of C's recent statement, but all hail Iowahawk for his use of metaphor in his rendition of Chaucer on the subject. It's pure genius.

From Iowahawk's post: Heere Bigynneth the Tale of the Asse-Hatte

61 Then bespake the Po-Mo artist,

62 "My last skulptyure was hailed as smartest

63 Bye sondry criticks at the Tate

64 Whom called it genius, brillyant, greate

65 A Jesus skulpted out of dunge

66 Earned four starres in the Guardian;

67 But now the same schtick withe Mo-ha-med

68 Has earned a bountye on my hed."

69 Sayed the Bishop, "that's quyte impressyve

70 To crafte a Jesus so transgressyve

71 But to do so with the Muslim Prophet

72 Doomed thy neck to lose whats off it.

73 Thou should have showen mor chivalrie

74 In committynge such a blasphemie."

Don't let the seemingly Middle English fool you. Just sound out the words, and laugh at the brilliant irony then go read the the whole thing.

We all know the fallacy of multi-culturalism is that it can't tolerate its own intolerance: All views and beliefs are ok except the belief that this belief isn't ok. But how about the grand irony of it all? They'll put up with, inlcude, and smash as conservative those who don't agree with anything that promotes patricarchy because, folks, it's all about control.

Adherents to multi-culturalism only balk when the traditions of a culture hit them viscerally such as the knife carving of young girls' vulvas and vaginas. Those, who do not practice such traditions, have such a knee jerk reaction to the pain and horror of it that even the men instictively cross their legs at the idea, and denounce it.

New practices based on old traditions and beliefs are up for grabs as well. The raping of babies to cure AIDS in South Africa is generally frowned upon by the multi-culturalists, and so they will denounce the practice and talk of educating these unfortunates in the hope of erasing this practice, but how far back can one go to erase a "new" practice? What is the statute of limitations? Can we go back and erase the extreme patriarchal practices of Islam that took firm hold during British and French colonialism? Can we start with their relatively moderate pre-Crusades traditions that inspired chivalry? Instead of that heinous WWJD (What would Jesus do?) acronym flaunted by the conservative (not all that) Christian groups, perhaps enlightened 21st Century thinkers are supposed to ask WWMCS (What would multiculturalists say?) and acti accordingly.

I remember getting chain emails from other women beginning in 1997 about the injustices of the Taliban. They were desperately trying to bring about awareness of the plight of women in Afghanistan and begging governments and activists' groups to force change. How might the world have changed if we had done something then? (I always find it ironic that Mohammed's sister, Fatma, was a hair exposing, hell raising, horseback riding warrior, but we're not supposed to follow her example too literally. ) Instead women under the Taliban received from the West a tisk tisk, Muslims are just mysoginists, not our problem. Why? Because a) there was no money in it for us, and b) way deep down multi-culturalists are as elitist as conservative patriarchs.

They are all too happy to be the few in control of the many, and so they unconsciously side with those, who know how to exert power, and none do it better than conservative Muslim men. After all, where does the Archbishop find compassion and justice for the women or children subjugated by Sharia law? (I wonder if his ancestors had issue with Roman law.) He seems more than willing to cast aside compassion for all in favor of control disguised as cooperation.

Unschooling and the Candidates

2008-02-04T13:54:00.000-05:00

There's been quite a debate going on on my local unschooler's list. We started out asking which candidates were pro-homeschooling, whereupon Logic Girl here pointed out that is was a somewhat pointless discussion, given that candidates never seem to keep their promises anyway.

Below is my latest response to the conversation, which has included the notorious, "WJWD" (what Jesus would do) and wholesale testimonials for Ron Paul and Huckabee. Yes, there are plenty of ultra conservative unschoolers out there, which never ceases to surprise me. (Said list is private, but I choose to share my response in this case.)

I discovered some facts over the weekend that crystalized a few things for me.

1. Ron Paul is very pro-life, which makes him quite a contradiction as a Libertarian.

2. Barak is for immediately pulling the troops out of Iraq with no question.

3. Hillary insists that we must leave the place with some kind of stability in place.

If your kid pounces on the cookie jar uninvited, knocks it over, breaks it and all the cookies inside, and generally makes mayhem of the kitchen, do you send him/her to bed immediately in order to clean up the mess yourself, leave it to the ants and rats to take over your kitchen, or do you expect him/her to help clean up the mess? (This argument does not apply to children under 3, and in so saying, I might be giving too much benefit of the doubt to too much of this administration.)

Personally, I was never in favor of the war. Yes, Saddam was horrific, (We should know. We put him in power.) but we went into Iraq under equipped without adequate cause and no support from the international community. Whether people were in favor or not, that's not a recipe for winning.

If we pull out immediately, we leave another mess, another Viet Nam, another Cambodia. We need to leave another Japan. The countries we occupied have faired better than those we abandoned and have posed far less threat upon recovery. Admittedly, I'd have a harder time saying this if I had loved ones there, and, truly, my heart goes out to all, who do.

As for Jesus, he seems to have had no problem with women in power. (It was Paul, who came on the scene years later, who damned us all.) Poor Mary Magdalene, so long unjustly accused of being the prostitute to be stoned, was, according to most Biblical scholars, a woman of independent means, who probably footed the bill for all those guys to stop being fishers of fish, and of course, it is recorded that it was she, not Peter, to whom Jesus first appeared and instructed to spread the word.

"WJWD" seems to be used as a manipulation tactic a lot, but if it makes people by hybrid cars and act with a little compassion now and again, I'll stop rolling my eyes. People, who claim God told them through prayer to lead particular ways have included numerous disgustingly corrupt popes and televangelists, David Koresh, and Charles Manson. Give me a rational non religious leader any day. Any fool can claim to be God-fearing, but peoples' lack of intelligence is quite verifiable.

As for how this relates to unschooling, France has never liked us despite our inspiring their revolution and our coming to their rescue in a couple of World Wars, but I'd really really like to take my child to the Louvre one day. I'd like to take Skyler all kinds of places to show him the richness and diversity of the world. How can I do that if everyone hates Americans because we continue to make messes that threaten everyone's peace?

Still pro-brains,
Victoria

Truthfully, every time I see those Ron Paul signs all over the place, the subversive humorist in my wants to cross out 'Ron' and write 'Ru.' RuPaul for president! (We could do a lot worse.)

The Exquisite Soulful Sounds of Daphne & Other Tales

2007-12-04T13:00:00.000-05:00

song du jour:Ghosts, Paul Mercer

Just before Thanksgiving Skyler and my honey and I took off for the upstairs performance space over Javaology to hear Paul Mercer and the exquisite Daphne, a violin, perform with The Ghost Project. I've been meaning to blog about Paul for a while now for he is an incredibly gifted musician and composer, whose infinite passion for the violin explodes in an array of beautiful sounds that resonate with my very soul. Definitely check out his myspace page to hear for yourself. He plays all over the world but is based in Atlanta and can occasionally be found playing intimate venues with great acoustics. We also caught him performing with The Ghost Project back in October at Oakland Cemetery's annual Victorian Festival. Oakland is Atlanta's oldest 'park' for once upon a time such spaces use to function as places to stroll and even picnic on Sunday afternoons.

When you look at the pics on myspace, check out the violin that belonged to John Freeman and inspired Paul's track Ghosts. John Freeman was my great great great grandfather. Paul and I met thanks to him and his descendants. The violin is damaged because it was very likely thrown in the canal with John when he was stabbed and robbed in London c.1888. His wife wrote to her father, a squire in Derbyshire, but refusing to back down from his extreme disapproval of her marriage to John, her father told her he would take her in if she put the children in an orphanage. The oldest, age 16, remained in England, and Elanor (Ellen) came to America with her 7 seven younger children.

When I first met Paul back in 1998, he was able to tell me much about John Freeman by the wear and tear of the violin. John was more of a classical or concert violinist because the wear on the fret board is even and not only toward the scroll as would indicate more of a fiddle player. Interestingly, the fretboard had been replaced but with a fairly cheap wood, stained to look ebony. John might have been a pro, but 8 kids didn't come cheap.

The violin is not playable in the usual sense, but Paul incorporated it nonetheless in the thumps, bumps, and other hair on end sounds at the beginning of the track. Whenever I listen to it, which is rather often, I feel it is as close as I can ever come to hearing my great great great grandfather play. I hear his extreme passion for playing, and I hear his anguish both in life and in death.

Oops! The 'k'

2007-11-30T10:05:00.000-05:00

Life of late has had an extra whirlwind element to it but in a good way. I recently taught a workshop in Seattle for a delightful bunch of smiths at a great facility, Jewelry Resource Supply. Before and since I've been in the throws of creativity, which is to say I've been making stuff like mad. To give you an idea list how busy things have been, neither my honey nor my mother nor I noticed my giant faux pas for Skyler's birthday party, but it did not escape my quick and teasingly smug friend, Beth, that on the Woodstock adorned birthday cake I had so lovingly decorated for my son I had iced. "Happy Birthday Syler." Gee, I gave the kid that name 8 years long ago, but it's not unreasonable that I should remember there is a 'k' in there somewhere.

Speaking of smug friends, I have another who has taken smugness to a whole new level. It took her some doing a while back, but she did manage to engage in that oh so dangerous endeavor, the matching up of close friends. He went on his first blind date (if you can call reading someones bio, blog, and artist statement and surfing her artwork for 2 hours a 'blind' date), and I was promised by said friend that this guy is "brains brawn and grace all in one package." Virginia was right, which she rather likes being. ;-) (She's a lawyer.)

2007-10-12T19:13:00.000-04:00

Because somewhere out there is someone, who actually said this at Giza:
Gawk at a Pyramid
I've been told that the caption is best said in a hick accent.

Real Beauty Tips

2007-10-12T19:11:00.001-04:00

Got this in an email on one of the homeschool lists. I've always thought Audry Hepburn was a good role model.

Audrey Hepburn’s "beauty tips:"

For attractive lips , speak words of kindness.

For lovely eyes , seek out the good in people.

For a slim figure , share your food with the hungry.

For beautiful hair , let a child run his/her fingers through it once a day.

For poise , walk with the knowledge that you never walk alone.

Best Ever William Tell

2007-10-12T19:08:00.000-04:00

Everything a typical mom says but done with style...
Best Ever William Tell

Praiseworthy

2007-09-27T23:24:00.000-04:00

I received an email with a link to this post along with the comment that I was perfect. It's all true... the yahoo post, I mean. ;-)

Techno Age

2007-09-24T11:17:00.001-04:00

Unlike my son, I'm not young enough to take technology completely for granted so when my mother called me just now from The British Museum, I was pleasantly freaked out just a bit. She wanted to know what books I wanted from the museum shop, which was incredibly sweet. She remembered my own fiasco of getting lost in London and arriving at the BM (Yes, they really call it that.) only 30 mintues before they closed. I never got to set foot in the museum shop, and my minute tour of the Elgin Marbles is a dim memory, but the statue of Rameses II that inspired Shelley's poem "Ozymandias" and the wall painting fragments of 18th Dynasty dancers are forever carved into my mind.

Unfortunately the moment of connectedness both to my mother and to that serene and stately space were broken as usual by AT&T. My mother may be the hippest of grandmothers with her new iPhone, but AT&T hasn't kept up with her or anyone else I know, who's stuck with them. I've been thinking Apple needs to have Lily Tomlin as Ernestine, the "because we're the telephone company and we can" telephone operator in their iPhone ads. At least those of us old enough not to take technology for granted could laugh with nostalgia that Ma Bell is firmly back to the level of customer service they could once claim in the 70's. I confess nonetheless I'm still saving my pennies for an iPhone!

Metalsmith magazine's Exhbition in Print is out!

2007-08-23T13:39:00.000-04:00

Metalsmith magazine's 2007 Exhibition in Print is out, featuring two of my pieces on page 40 along with a description of them by the curator, Ellen Lupton, including this quote that I love, "Such pieces recall the tradition of the locket, which fetishizes the mechanical aspect of jewelry and encloses an image known only to the wearer."
For more views of the work depicted click the thumbnails.

Dear Mom, Send Cheetos

2007-08-21T22:56:00.000-04:00

I returned yesterday from an all too brief trip, a filigree lecture/demo in Seattle, and a workshop for writers and artists with Nick Bantock in British Columbia. If you don't recognize his name, then it's probably because a) You know and love his work but haven forgotten the creator's name; b) You're going to click on his name and upon seeing his work wonder how on earth you have missed it or survived without it, and are now supremely grateful that you have found that which you have so long sought; c) You don't consider yourself artistically educated and just need a little nudge in the right direction; or d) You're a Philistine. Fortunately, if your answer was 'd,' you're probably not reading this blog anyway.

I haven't found any particular non cliche oriented words to describe the workshop. Anything I can say falls flat and somehow cheapens the depth and breadth of it, including that last statement. My work will never be the same, nor my approach to it. I connected with incredibly wonderful people with whom I hope to stay in touch. I spent 4-1/2 days laughing nearly constantly. Ok, perhaps not completely flat, but still all vast understatements.

The setting was beyond picturesque, however, if any of you omnivores out there ever head to Hollyhock, which features gourmet vegetarian fare, let me suggest you pack some emergency provisions. I'm not the biggest meat eater in the world, but I do run borderline anemic and need vast amounts of protein and carbs to sustain not only my witty reparte but also my abilities to do simple math or speak a sentence in some type of sequential and understandable form. By friday I'd have needed a pound of bacon just to stop the shaking.

Much of the emphasis (and rightly so) was on working quickly and intuitively, from our right brains more than our left and, so when I asked Nick for feedback on my collage du jour, and he told me (once again) to listen to what the collage needed rather than what I thought I should be doing to it, I replied, "My collage is telling me that its artist needs a cheeseburger."

I hate the way brown rice sticks in my porcelain crowns. Potatoes, be they mashed, baked, twice baked, French fried, or in the sacred potato chip form are among my dearest friends, yet I only saw them once while I was there. Cheese is not far down from chocolate on the list of life's necessities. I've never eaten lettuce two meals per day for 4 days, but I became desperate for filler that wasn't mushy. I don't tend to believe that squash should be eaten more than three times in a week, and if I see another bean again any time soon, I'll scream.

For all my bitching about food, there were some extraordinary and completely unexpected moments outside the workshop at Hollyhock. I must have seen no less than 4 shooting stars in the space of an hour and once discovered the most gorgeous carpet of moss when I took a 'wrong' path back to my room. It's also not every day that I get to be utterly blown away at the musical talents of Rupert Sheldrake's young sons. (Oh, if I were seventeen again...!) Even on a decrepit piano, good jazz shines through.

I gave up much in the way of suitcase room to pack the paints I knew I would need. Although a sweatshirt would have been cozy, there are places at Hollyhock that one doesn't need much at all such as at the hot tubs. Apparently for a number of people, red wine does decrease inhibitions. Extremely dark wooded landscapes help too. As one friend used to tell me, I won't be the old lady in the nursing home, who only tells boring stories.

It's so easy to be in a transformative setting and believe with all one's being that the transformations occuring will continue when the space that supports it dissolves, and far be it from me to add much more diatribe to an already exhausted argument. In the world of developmental psychology and integral theory, the excruciatingly frequent explanations of "States and Stages" are so overdone that the proverbial beaten dead horse not only has no flesh left, its bones are a pile of dust ironically leaving some, who don't quite understand the difference between the permanent acquisition of skills and a momentary glimpse of nirvana, no more enlightened.

My own contribution to the attempts at clarification (does an extrovert ever really shut up?!?) would be that even in such a brief span of time when the body is taught to express creatively with skill and technique at the same time that the mind and heart are open, then for the creative person at least there is no going back to how things were without screaming (or a lot of drugs).

I flew back to Atlanta on a red eye, and at dawn almost over home saw clouds and a rising sun I had never seen before. I saw my child yet more radiant, my neighborhood anew, and my house as only a vaguely familiar space that I own instead of feeling as I had, that it owns me. I have never felt more whole, nor ever felt with such calm certainty that what always was, always is and is always with me no matter how fragmented life seems. I learned, much as I'm always preaching, that in our world there is really only creativity that spans the dark and light and the duende that moves us to echo it. The universe with its achingly beautiful tones and chiarascuro is really just one big collage and we the snippets of texture within it.

Thomas Jefferson Would Probably Be Disappointed

2007-08-08T23:48:00.000-04:00

Great quotations from Thomas Jefferson.

"Yes, we did produce a near perfect Republic. But will they keep it,
or will they, in the enjoyment of plenty, lose the memory of freedom?
Material abundance without character is the surest way to
destruction."

"If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of
civilization, it expects what never was and never will be."

"Good citizens make the society they live in; bad citizens train
themselves to fit the world they are given by their masters."

These were courtesy of a fellow unschooling mom on our yahoo list. To me, ignorant equals head in the sand like an ostrich, and "book learning" doesn't equal critical thinking skills any more than school equals education or Fox equals news. Wake up and smell the air pollution! Our society's entire system of education is based creating obedient factory workers. Of course, most of those jobs have gone to China... I have to go make a phone call now that can easily and legally be wire tapped, and then I have to fill out some ridiculous paperwork that allows me to declare than I can educate my own child the way I see fit. Ain't freedom grand?

I Love Deadlines... (yeah, right)

2007-07-24T16:17:00.000-04:00

A former student of mine once told me the best quote I've ever heard to describe how artists work:

"I love deadlines. I love that whoooshing sound they make as they fly by." She found it inside the pages of a day planner, but upon googling it, I just found it attributed to Douglas Adams. Well, it's brilliant and funny, so go figure...

I seem to need deadlines. I need their stress and that panicked feeling that flushes through me as the numbers on the calendar gain momentum toward the number with the big circle. Not that I'm ever behind or anything! No, well, ok, a couple of days, but nothing that I can't finish really soon.. or so I think.

What I just finished working on was, um, how to say without giving it all away... things that involve sequentially ordered photos and writing that show up in certain types of retail outlets at monthly intervals. These very lovely people for whom I toiled, work so far in advance it makes my head spin, so don't run to your local book haven just yet. We're talking months, sometimes 12-18. Most artists' idea of doing anything that far in advance means making something inspired in the moment (and finishing it over a period of weeks or months) that will take a few years before someone with the appropriate taste and bank account realizes its actual brilliance, and as long as I've been doing this, let me tell you that process on which I am so very dependent still seems to happen by near total accident.

Now the funny thing about making a piece that is photographed at each step along the way is that while one is actually making the piece, one is not actually finishing that step in front of the lens. That's a long way of saying that knowing I have already taken a photo of my hands forming a piece of wire, I feel like a dork when I can't find the little bit I formed, only to realize after searching my bench that I never made it. It's really still the same little beginning of a spiral on the end of a long coil of wire as it was when I set the timer to shoot my hands holding it and a pair of pliers.

Sometimes the opposite occurs. I finish soldering something not knowing if the timed photo I took of it has turned out, and if it didn't I either have to start that entire part from scratch to re-shoot, or I have to fire up the torch and pretend to solder something that I already have, which, when I'm concentrating on the photograph rather than the process means I have a far greater chance of doing something stupid like melting the metal in question. Along the way are other fun little considerations like trying to remember to keep that little cord between the camera and lens cap out of the flame lest ma camera est flambe. High quality problem as it is, I'd bet I was one of the only people in the world at that moment having that particular little worry.

The most frustrating thing of all is having to work in semi-darkness to get the exposure right. I feel like a bat metalsmith. (Sure I can solder by sound!) If I have to work very long between photographed steps, I run around the bench and flip on the track lights, but the back and forth thing becomes a rather ridiclus little dance that only leaves me vulnerable to distraction on the way to and from the bench, and distraction is very bad for deadlines.

In order to create just the right ambience that inspires flow, there is a limited range of A/V stuff allowed here in the studio, things that are guaranteed to produce a zen like blissful state of creativity. They consist of certain types of documentaries such as Simon Schama's The Power of Art (I give it 5 long happy 'ah's'), The History Detectives, anything to do with Egyptology, medieval Europe, astronomy, and physics, PBS's Mystery! or Masterpiece Theatre, and a range of BBC America mysteries, Britcoms, and DIY shows. - Do we detect a theme here? Yes, I have a need to solve things.

On the audio front, I've long been a chill-lounge-world fusion devotee in here. There's something about laid bak funky beats and jazzish cords that help drop the sense of time I must shed to do my best work. My internet radio station of choice has become Soma FM's 'Secret Agent Radio' thanks to Jean, who reminded me it's still there a while back. It's the range of music I just described with the occasional kitchy 60's theme song or even Louis Armstrong thrown in, and the odd bits of interspersed movie clips, usually of the James Bond variety, remind me I'm not alone in the universe without actually being intrusive. They also make me laugh, which can be essential in the face of 'design changes.'

In an effort to rev up my working time, I tried a different station for the hell of it. It was called, "Really Music Radio" with the tag line, "music without borders," and what obscure world beat were they throwing down? "You Can't Always Get What You Want" by the Rolling Stones. I've always considered the seemingly random playing of that song to be as close as one gets to a sign from God (It has a way of creeping up and reminding one, doesn't it?), but it wasn't exactly what I was in search for or expecting. Next I tried a different SomaFM station, some kind of lounge hip cool bachelor pad from the 60's format, but it reminded me of the boring radio my parents used to keep on when I was a kid. The music was old then, but not quite old enough to be kitch and cool. One doesn't want flashbacks while oporating a torch. ;-) Back to Secret Agent Radio, "the soundtrack for my stylish, mysterious, and dangerous life."

Oh, and just to add that extra fun challenge to needing to work fast, it's a bit warm in here. In case you haven't watched The Weather Channel lately or don't happen to have a 7 year old, who likes to imitate the local forecast along with the hummed smooth jazz instrumentals in between the current temp and the relative humidity, we're having a heat wave down here!!! I came out of Trader Joe's this afternoon and thought I'd already gotten into my car that was parked in the sun, but alas I had only stepped into the parking lot.

In case I haven't mentioned it lately, I DON'T HAVE AIR CONDITIONING!!! Oh, yes, it's a grand time to be had by all. My bedroom is a breezy 89 F, and that's not to imply anything untoward of a heated nature, for what the fahrenheit could one possibly stand to do in such stifling heat? I can't even sleep! Don't even ask what the studio is for there is always a 10 degree difference between it and the rest of my house, and the swing goes inconveniently right along with whatever is going on outside. Next winter when I'm complaining about the cold, I'll just remember this moment and hope it keeps my toes warm. Stick a fork in me; I'm done.

Space, Time, and S(n)ap Decisions

2007-07-05T18:38:00.000-04:00

In the midst of reading Leonard Shlain's Art & Physics: Parallel Visions in Space, Time, and Light, I read Malcolm Gladwell's Blink. What a mind bender. I confess that over the months I've been picking up, putting down, and slowly digesting Art & Physics, I've probably read 8 other books, given that in the midst of my non-fiction information gathering obsession, I tend to need to zone out with a literary mystery rather often to feel balanced. Having been thrilled by The Tipping Point also by Gladwell, I opted to cart Blink along to the SNAG conference for comparatively light plane reading and to attempt to come down at night from the brilliant non stop art talk that often continued in my head even after my partners in crime and I would finally call it a night.

If you haven't read all three of these books, go visit your favorite book source ASAP. Despite how long I've dragged out Shlain's first book, I consider it a must read even if you're neither an artist nor a physicist. (I've read all his books, and cannot recommend them highly enough. In fact, if you consider yourself well educated or even vaguely intelligent - how about English speaking and breathing? - consider wrapping your head around one of his extremely important topics, and for you folks into Wilber, there is much that will be hauntingly familiar about Art & Physics, which sports a copyright date of 1991.)

What I found so track stopping about reading Blink toward the end of A&P is, among other things, the notions of snap decision making under excessive stress, followed by further reading into how we perceive time. Blink describes the various phenomenon involved in first impressions and embedded associations and how that plays out in people, who can correctly spot an art fake instantaneously to police officers, who, thinking someone has drawn a weapon, shoot before they have time to realize that there was no gun. It lays bare how some of our deepest associations that are inescapably part of our cultures can determine our decision making processes in who we pick as mates and friends, or who we hire for jobs and how such unconscious information continues the struggle for racial and gender equality even when we believe ourselves to be evolved, forward thinking, and totally fair.

Shlain's book describes how artists portray in painting and sculpture, scientific concepts that are only discovered, theorized, and accepted decades or even centuries later. Consider the ancient Greeks' belief that time is linear and how in their paintings and friezes all figures and actions are occuring on one plane. Though they portray the figure three dimensionally, there is no depth to the action through the use of scale. Aperspectival painting such as Cubism and the later realization that there is no fixed space in the universe is another easy and intuitive example.

The ancient Egyptians were content to portray what they believed was their best foot forward, so to speak, painting figures in unnatural flat poses. It was not that they were naive, but that the wished to show the world the way they idealized it. Chiaroscurro (shading) didn't really catch on until just before the Renaissance nor did foreshortening make a comeback until then. We take for granted the ability to 'read' three dimensional images from drawings and photographs, but in fact the ability to do so requires that one focus one's eyes just in front of the image, a fairly recent development for humans. If we must see a certain way in order to make sense of art, magazine, billbroads, and even TV, how must we see to gather the correct information needed to make the best snap decisions? How must we look to avoid the pitfalls of erroneous first impressions?

Grocery Shopping and Momentary Autism

Gladwell makes a great case for the idea that under an overload of mental and physical stress, 'normal' people behave much like high functioning autistic people. People with autism can be brilliant and quite functional, yet they take things literally and lack the ability to pick up on the subtle cues of facial expression, tone of voice, or, I would expect, even read between the lines, that essential ability necessary to communicating by email without starting too many arguments. Without these fundamental ways of gathering information anything that is taken into account to make a decision must be word for word or visually literal. For example, if someone confronted by the police pulls something out of his pocket, it can't be ID or some note explaining that the person does not speak English or cannot speak at all; it must be a gun, and officers, who have mistakenly fired will swear that they have seen a gun because they have the association of 'reach into pocket' and 'pull out weapon' for a very understandable reason, and the incredible stress they are under in such situations will actually produce the belief (even the vision) that the gun was there.

Of course, not all bad momentary decisions are life and death. Think back to a fender bender in which time slowed down, and you could see how your and the other person's decisions were playing out, but there was no time to reverse the action. How about the last time you said yes to what turned out to be a really bad date? The last time you didn't handle a situation the way you would have preferred at work? How can we increase our abilities to make better decisions under the gun?

Gladwell, and the heady researchers he quotes, say that rehearsal is everything. Practice saying, "thanks but no." to those best left undated. Practice dialing 911 when you really don't have to (just don't push 'send' unless you mean it!). Each time you practice one of these actions, your heart rate will lower from fast and panicked, and you will more likely operate in the optimal range of heightened awareness rather than literally in shock. In addition to possibly saving someone's life, it will get easier to say no to inappropriate potential mates, and you'll sound smarter at work.

A few weeks ago, someone was pounding on my door at almost midnight on a Sunday night. Even though I wasn't alone in the house, I freaked. It took me 4 tries to correctly dial 911 on my mobile phone. (I finally gave up and used the land line once I remembered where it was hung up.) now living in an urban environment, I'm no stranger to calling the police and can usually do so without freaking out, but because a few variables were different (probably not being on my own and in 'in charge' mode), I panicked. Turned out the banging was the police. They were stopping by because I'd called an hour earlier about a neighbor, who was showing the world his stereo went up to 11. Lesson learned.

Today, however, was quite different. With one trip complete, one coming up, the need for new eyeglasses, and 2 deposits that were supposed to go through before today but didn't, grocery shopping on a budget took on a whole new meaning. I had convinced myself that not having anything in the fridge but peas, Sky's favorite frozen pizza, chicken nuggets, and a few science experiments did indicate that hunter/gatherer time was now, so the downward spiral into Stressland began at Trader Joe's and ended at Whole Foods, that wonderland of organic goodies, where I swear I will only spend $40, and end up spending $100.

At Trader Joe's a very enthusiastic and sociable little girl almost Skyler's size came up and introduced herself to him. Now, having a child, who came out of the womb running for president, I didn't find her behavior the least bit curious. I turned to her mother and said, "I see you have and extrovert too!" The mother confessed to me that most people didn't take her daughter's sociability so well and then said she was high functioning autistic and tended to be more than a little outside the stereotype. After saying that her daughter seemed quite normal in my world, I explained that my son has hearing loss and blows out of the water the stereotype that hard of hearing children are quiet introverts, who miss all the jokes. If this conversation shared at the cheese section seems a little on the "too much information." side, know that this is how mothers cope. We share the most intimate details of the challenges of parenting our children, and deem it completely normal. Yes, your parents probably did this too.

We fully expected to run into them at Whole Food, 3 blocks from Trader Joe's, and perhaps if we had gotten to laugh again, my stress spiral would have adopted a livable holding pattern. Instead I spend yet another grocery shopping trip, trying to read my list, remember what wasn't on it, find what I needed, and try to guess what I might be hungry for 2 days from now (how do people know that?!?) all while constantly saying, "Come on, Skyler! ...Slow down with the cart! ...Stay with me, Skyler! ...Don't rock the items on the shelf like they're vibrating while you click your mouse on them! ...No, come on! ...Slow down with the cart! ...No, that's made on equipment shared by nuts (coconuts, peanuts, or sesame seeds)! ...Slow down with the cart! ...No, we're not geting that this trip... we don't have enough money today...No, we can't go to the bank and just get more... ...Slow down with the cart!" and so on. Mr. Social has a very difficult time with the background noise of AC and refrigerator hums, mixed with canned music, noisy people, and squeaky shopping cart wheels. I have a hard time coping with his coping mechanisms. If I'd found my new mom friend again, I'd have given her my number and suggested a park day. Skyler isn't autistic, but I find that life continues to seem doable when I bond with other outside the box moms and kids.

By the time I had 5 items in the cart, I was a walking stressfest. Aware that this was now hour 5 of my allotted 2 hours of errand running time, and freaking out at the idea of having to put anything back at the checkout, I couldn't make a decision about what to buy to save my life. Sometime before I reached the checkout, I managed to realize that I had a cart full of veggies that go in things like scallions, chips, milk, and organic face soap but nothing to eat for dinner. If in my craze of snack wheeling frustration, I had pulled over and taken a deep breath or talked with Skyler before going in the store about the cooperation I needed to get in and out quick, I might have remembered that not all the checks I wrote would clear tonight, giving me time to shuffle funds and eat with peace. Unfortunately, I wasn't much of a high functioning anything. I was "crazed crabby mom," ready to snap. Not good for a woman approaching what are known on my paternal side as the early stroke/heart attack years.

This would be where I sum up this little (ha) essay brilliantly with how Shlain's parallels of space relate to everything I was just saying, but I'm too bloody tired, and, stupidly, I still haven't had dinner. Briefly, (again ha!) I will say that what we 'know' and what we instantaneously decide are the domains of the right brain more than the left. Although Shlain spends more time discussing the functions of the right brain than Gladwell does, I would say that this area of gestalt is where much our gut lies. It is where we perceive the whole of a situation enough to intuit how we need to proceed. Creativity, which involves selecting the optimum option from multiple solutions is totally impaired when we are stressed beyond that optimal zone Gladwell describes, leaving us unable to cope with snap decisions of any kind. While brainstorming and mulling over the various options, functions of the right and left brains respectively, aren't options for snap decision making (or grocery shopping when the ice cream is melting), developed creativity allows us to draw on and quickly select solutions in adverse conditions without necessarily being weighed down by too much information (analysis paralysis).

As if I needed another reason to preach the merits of creativity... We need it in ways that cannot be quantitatively assessed by the left brain. We need it to visualize calmly where all the phones are when we have to dial 911, and we need it to remember that our world is not a linear structure that will fall apart if there are only peas in the freezer.

The Personals Column

2007-07-02T23:45:00.000-04:00

To L-
Whatever you intended did not arrive safely. Thank you for contacting at the next port of call.
SV Madcap

(Sorry, the rest of you will just have to speculate.)
;-)

Jammin' with the Rock Stars & Metalheads: SNAG 2007

2007-06-27T23:15:00.000-04:00

There is no substitute in life for the thrill of speaking the same language with like minds, and for 4-1/2 days I spent an unexpectedly blissful time doing just that at the Society of North American Goldsmiths conference in Memphis, TN. Alas, I have been slowly crashing back down to 'reality' ever since. I've never been interested in much of anything that is mainstream, and such a bent toward the creative and seemingly obscure equals a lifetime of not finding tons of people to relate to at parties or anywhere else for that matter. Despite the throngs of people, who take classes in gold or silversmithing during the course of their lives, I and my career choice remain ever from Mars as far as most strangers, the majority of acquaintances, and a large portion of my friends are concerned.

That all changed for a brief time, beginning when I slammed down the door to the overhead luggage compartment, moved my backpack to sit down, and the young woman in the airplane seat next to mine said, "Going to SNAG?" I held up my 6 rings near my choker and earrings, and said, "How did you guess?" with a big smirk. From that moment until my flight landed back in Atlanta Sunday night, I was in a world where not only was what I do normal, people could actually talk about what motivates us to do what we do as well as all the fun technical talk, and no one's eyes glazed over nor did anyone look bored. It was paradise (and I didn't even visit Graceland).

In part, I was there to help one of my vendors promote my DVD, which went well, and I ended up with yet another vendor for the conference as well. I watched a demo given by Mary Lee Hu, whose published work I've drooled over since I was in college, saw a slide presentation on art knives, given by Phil Baldwin, which permanently awoke my long buried desire to make sharp things in Damascene steel, and was moved beyond all belief by a presentation of work by blacksmith, Tom Joyce.

I'd seen Tom on PBS's Craft in America a few weeks ago, and while I had been familiar with some of his work, the interview and then the presentation moved me more than I can find words to express. It is rare that someone in the world of 'craft' will open up and speak of the personal inspiration behind his or her work, and hearing Tom do so gave me more courage to talk about mine particularly since there were so many parallels in what inspires me. - If having to explain what a metalsmith is (and why I'm not a jewelry designer) to people produces the glazed over look, then believe me, saying that I am mesmerized by metal because each atom I work with was, like you, me and everything else in our world, once cooked in a star, only makes people smile politely before resuming talking about themselves or finding an excuse to get away quickly. - The presentation went 45 minutes overtime, and I didn't want it to end.

Unfortunately, not having more than a couple of friends (artists and performers of course), who can relate, is painful, and the result of my not sharing more about what makes me want to get up in the morning has left me with too many morning that I didn't want to get out of bed. At SNAG I never wanted to go to bed in the first place. In fact, on this trip when I was going to catch up on sleep, since Skyler went to the beach with his Gran, I ended up staying up until sunrise most nights, talking with friend and fellow Atlanta based metalsmith, Helen Blythe-Hart. We even outlasted the third member of our entourage, fellow smith, student and friend, Lisa Winn, and, trust me, outlasting Lisa is saying something. That we three became closer and can still get together is no small thing, but the other 450 people certainly lent a warmth, support, and ambience of enthusiasm that could not follow us home.

So if meeting those greats, who have gone before me, talking ideas with people from around the world, and making important contacts with people, who were so much fun to talk with I wouldn't have even cared what their positions were, weren't enough, I discovered that I have groupies. (Yes, Elvis, move over.) In the meantime, I have accepted that I can no longer listen politely to friends, who expect me to understand their jobs and professions, yet after years of knowing them still don't get mine. Better Stellaluna be alone in the studio than ever a bat among birds. I'll probably survive until the next conference in Savannah in March, but I will be counting the days.

V on TV!

2007-06-12T10:54:00.000-04:00

Friday, June 15 at 9:30am HGTV will finally air the segment of me working that they taped in April of 2006 for their show, That's Clever! As the date approaches at last, I've been remembering snippets of the experience of a 4 person crew + me in my studio (and how punchy we were by the end). 6 hours of work into 7 minutes to show and CLOSELY following their usual formula... It should be very interesting. There's also a strong possibility that Skyler will be in the intro, depending on which take they use. It's all in the editing.

Yesterday I received Rio Grande's 600-page 2007 Tools & Equipment Catalog with my DVD conspicuously displayed in the 'new products' section. (For those of you not in the know, Rio is the largest supplier to both the commercial and artistic sides of jewelry. Their catalogs are the end all be all of cool stuff... sort of like the Sears catalog circa 1950.)

The day before my national TV debut is Flag Day here in the U.S., which is also known as the anniversary of when I last turned 29. ;-) For this year's birthday I get... fame. (It better last longer than 15 minutes.)

Morph Me, Baby

2007-06-06T01:21:00.000-04:00

Women in Art, literally
Very cool and of special interest to all you geeks out there!

13 Things Never to Say to an Artist

2007-06-04T01:23:00.000-04:00

I caught most of PBS's new series of Crafts in America (and taped the rest), which premiered this past week. They were exceedingly well done. In fact the only fault I could find with them was that of all the people I've asked, no one seems to have watched them. The series does a great job depicting what makes artists inspired to work in different materials and techniques, ones that only the ignorant and the dreadfully postmodern don't define as the stuff of Art.

Ever since I got out of college I've had a lot of trouble with the word 'craft.' In school, I was in an atmosphere so demanding that I never experienced any snobbery from those majoring in what I'd later learn was 'fine art.' The trouble with the word 'craft' is that it puts people, who create painfully exquisite one-of-a-kind works lower down on the heirarchy than, oh, gee, I don't know, some dude, who thinks art is putting a shark in a tank of formaldehyde (not that I'm naming any names or anything). In fact, it puts our work in a category lower down than 'artisan cheese.' The day I heard the term, 'rap recording artist' I'd had enough. "Move over, Prince," I said. "I am permanently known as the Artist Known as Victoria."

Alas, though, such declaration did little for what I would still encounter at parties when people would ask what I do. Despite the throngs of people, who get into flame throwing as a hobby or even a profession, the way I do what I do, and the level (of intensity and insanity) at which I do it remains obscure and off the radar of a culture steeped in Wallmart and Targzhay.

As I was admiring the handmade books by a fellow exhibitor at a show last year, their creator handed me a fan book with a smirk and said, "Here, as another artist you'll enjoy this one." It was titled 13 Things Never to Say to an Artist." (The text was quoted from I forgot where, so if anyone could give me a source, I'd be greatful.) On each page was the kind of tactless and clueless line that makes people like me consider the merits of permanent seclusion, followed by what most artists wish they could really reply. My favorite was, "I really like your work, but it doesn't go with my sofa. Could you paint another one it in magenta, teal, and puce?" In smaller type below was, "Get a new sofa!"

The book has inspired me to write a list of my own. Upon meeting someone, whose profession was as obscure to me as mine is to most, I asked a question so stupid and patronizing that I have actually blocked it from my memory, and so in the name of helping others not to endure such embarrassment as well as my peers and myself to have a better time at parties, may I present

13 Things Never to Say to a Metalsmith

1. I have a piece JUST like that that I bought in Mexico!
No, you really don't. If you think you do, you're not actually looking at my work.

2. I have a piece I bought on my trip to _____ that you would just LOVE to see.
Not as in "come see my etchings," but as in sometimes people feel compelled to relate by... well... just talking rather than actually looking at the art of the artist to whom they are speaking.

3. I really like your work and would buy it for my wife, but she likes platinum and diamonds.
I make art men can wear too. (At least your wife had good taste in picking out you.)

4. This is my friend, Victoria. She's a jewelry designer.
I know you're wondering what's wrong with this one, so let me explain. Technically a designer is someone, who draws what something should look like, so that other people can make it, as opposed to an artist/smith, who might or might not draw an idea on paper first, but creates the work him/herself. Unfortunately, every person, who puts 2 beads on a string now calls themselves a "jewelry designer." (I'm not knocking bead people here! Be assured that people, who put flame to glass or weave intricate complex compositions from tiny spheres are rolling their eyes right along with me.)

Being introduced as a jewelry designer at parties with few artists attending will produce a lot #1, 2, 3, and 9, and a cacophony of #5 and 8. (The last time this happened to me, some strange woman, who disapproved of my prices, began lovingly fondling my rings, a very understandable reaction, which would have been appreciated had I not been wearing them at the time.)

While we're at it, I don't consider myself a jeweler either. A jeweler is usually someone, who sits hunched over a bench, soldering replacement prongs on depressingly unartful and mass produced diamond rings or maybe carves wax to order for custom work (or more likely orders such things out of catalogs). If some smiths want to call themselves jewelers as well, fine; they certainly can, but you'll note that no where on this entire site have I ever used the word until now.

5. Someone told me you 'do' jewelry. Can you fix every broken thing in my jewelry box and convert my earrings from posts to clips (or clips to posts)?
I don't mind referring someone in need to a repair place. Hey, we all break stuff. I'm annoyed when people I don't even know act put out and start arguing with me as to why I won't fix their stuff when I've patiently explained that I don't do repairs and don't even possess the necessary equipment. If I were to tell someone I was a painter, would their next sentence be, "I have this painting that got ripped; can you fix it?" Probably not.

6. Did you cast that?
Ugh, no. Ok, I admit there are one or two smiths out there, who do some cool things with one of a kind castings (no mold is made), but for the most part cast = mass produced = junk = dude, who will probably never buy anything while trying to impress me that he knows the name of an actual metal technique.

7. Ooo, ya know what you should make?
Yes, that's part of why I work all the time. I get these ideas you see... One friend used to say this me all the time until she took a painting class, and with a big grin I said, "Hey, ya know what you ought to paint?" It's good we can laugh about it now. (I know your reading this!) ;-)

8. Why is you're work so expensive?!?
Because it takes a bloody long time to make! Do you feel the need to be monetarily compensated for what you do? Me too. A friend once overheard another artist at a show reply to this questions by saying, "Quality isn't for everyone." I wish I had that kind of nerve.

9. How long did it take you to make that?
A fair question, but one for which the only honest answer is my entire lifetime thus far. If you put your soul and the sum total of your experience into something...

10.What gauge is it?!?
This is only funny to my students, who have been known frequently to yell the question as they pop their heads up from their diligent and furious note taking like demented prairie dogs to inquire the thickness of the metal I'm using in a demonstration. The problem isn't that they ask but that 3 people have already asked, 3 more will ask within the next 5 minutes, and I'm still struggling to say without interruption, "Hi, today we're making a..."

11. Where do you get your stones?
It's not that weird a question, and I usually amuse people by telling them about my opal dealer, who owns his own mine in Australia and tells tales of sitting around the campfire at night, trading kangaroo marinade recipes with other miners. (I know, I know, but apparently they are like deer there.) Unfortunately this question makes the list because, when asked right away, it is an indication that someone regards all my very hard work and artistry as merely being a way to make stones stick on your fingers, neck, or earlobes.

12. You make jewelry? I have some ______ (usually lapis) at home.
I never know why I'm supposed to be impressed by this. Not that there's anything wrong with lapis or whatever someone has on hand, in fact, odds are I have or have had way more of it laying around my house than they do (unless they're talking crystals). Unlike #2, however, this is usually uttered in the spirit of come see my etchings, and really if this is the best a guy can do...

13. You just need to get _________ (usually Sara Jessica Parker or Atl resident, Jane Fonda) to wear your stuff.
If they want to buy it, I'm thrilled. They'll go to the top of the Selected Collectors and Collections section on my resume. If, however, I'm just supposed to lend or give work away to get it moving down a red carpet, I'd be doomed. Within a week jewelry designers (no, the other kind) would be sending orders off to China or Indonesia for bad knock off versions of what little of my work could actually be reproduced. In a month the Style Channel would be showing Voguers where to buy that look for less, and all my serious collectors would instead collect other artists, whose work is still one-of-a-kind. No, far better the person with the marketing schemes pulls out his/her credit card and buys my work. That always impresses me.

Call me a bitch, but if I were a guy, you'd just say I have artistic integrity.
;-)

Part 2 of our Latest Podcast

2007-05-31T12:24:00.000-04:00

Up on the Polysemy site is part 2 of the premiere podcast with Dan Allison, Thom Morgan, Matthew Dallman, and me. This is a continuation of our discussion about an experiment in which virtuoso violinist, Joshua Bell, anonymously played his Strad during the morning rush hour in a Washington D.C. metro station.

Please join us as we take the discussion even further.
Part 2 at Polysemy.org
Part 1 at Polysemy.org

Pearls Before Breakfast, The Washington Post with clips of the sublime and sexy Mr. Bell, playing that most resonant instrument

Homeschooling and socialization

2007-05-23T12:00:00.000-04:00

Finally, a brief but highly accurate assessment of the issue of socialization and homeschooling (Be sure to scroll all the way across.)