Besides the music, I make jewelry,
in two distinctive styles--
Beadwork framed in silver, and miniature sculpture,
And an "animal spirit" series of graphic designs.
The images below are representative.
Beadwork
in Silver
White Buffalo Calf
Woman
This is an honoring piece, symbolizing her teachings. The seven ceremonies are represented by the rainbow of seven hoops around the pipestem, and the seven silver hoops in the necklace.
Sterling silver, beads,
Yowah Valley boulder opal
The Wings
of Imagination
Miniature
sculptures in silver, with crystals, crystal spheres, and gemstones.
A varietyof mythical and real
critters, including the dragon, faery, phoenix, dolphins, whales, a raptor,
coyote with his tail caught on a cactus, Sculpted in jeweler's wax, cast,
and molded. Most were designed as pendants, but some can also be made into
earrings.
Animal Spirits
Scalable Graphics
The animal spirits are scalable graphic designs that can be embroidered or printed on t-shirts or other clothing, on coffee cups, et cetera, or be wall art.
The
lightning bolt appears in all the designs as
the symbol of their spirit,
Mother Earth's critters are
more powerul than we imagine.
Silver, beads, lavendar
garnet in gold bezel
The stone setting "floats" in the beadwork,
woven into place with no other support.
"Raptor"
A wax original for casting in silver
It's about one inch high, with the detail done under 5x magnification.
Coyote
Walks the Rainbow Path
Silver and beadwork pendant
"Klagetoh"
Rug weaver's loom, 4" x 6"
A working miniature in silver and beads.
The patterns and colors of Dineh rugs from different regions are distinctive, hence are generally easy to identify. The Klagetoh rugs happen to be my personal favorite.
My grandad on my father's side
gave me the confidence I could make
and/or figure out how to fix anything
that I could get my hands around. . .
and playing a musical instrument is,
in the end, just another handcraft.
But if I drew you a sketch
of something I was going to make--
of what I see so clearly in my head--
you'd wonder why I was going to bother.
Doing the beadwork designs finally taught me
a few of the basic things about how to draw,
but to this day, people who paint pictures--
who find 2-dimensional representations
of 3-dimensional things easy to do--
genuinely impress me.
