Art meets Fingers

Some of my best friends are fingers.When the mountain won't come to Mohammed, Mohammed must make her way to the mountain. People do what they must. I must do artwork. During times when being upright isn't in the cards, I have returned to my stash of techniques for fingers, learned when I was 6 yrs old. My American grandmother tatted and crochetted. My German mother knitted and embroidered. This is beside all the painting and drawing I did daily. To paraphrase my dear friend in the arts, Jo Gentry Haemer, about our era:

"Our parents taught us not to define ourselves by the culture we consume, but by the culture we create."

I don't define myself by the varying conditions of life. That IS life. When bad times come I am not a failure. In good times, I am not special. I am always grateful, period. I was privileged to have family members who helped me practise with my hands how to take hold of a life and make it my own. These were people who were used to making and doing for themselves, because they came from war and imprisonment, the Great Depression, and other hardships which taught them, along with their forebears how to handmake a life regardless of the terms. I include all sorts of vintage and found objects from long ago in my work as my nod to my teachers.


What can I show you? People look at the tiny bead crochet I employ within mixed media reUse jewelry designs, wondering "How do you have the patience!" My daughters have learned how to implement this technique, and true, you do have to stick with it. But here is what is so valuable about learning this and other manual skills. Only so much of living in a body comes from recognizing what to do (with the frontal lobe). Here's what I mean. You can see the dance the fingers do with the beads and thread, but there is no substitute for getting your own tactile and motor processes to dance this way!
When horizontal for prolonged periods, my hands are free to dance these beads along with mindful intention. I can still create the culture I inhabit, with purpose. What gives you purpose? How do you teach this to others?

Art meets Hope

Jeff Lindsey puts his hands on metal and it roars to life.

My first view of "Green Treefrog" was when he had me close my eyes, then open them to see it standing astride this italian motorcycle he gave me for Christmas a few years back. Unforgettable! The bike was phenomenal (a mint 1958 Gilera which had won the Motogiro D'Italia in 1991 and had the official seal to prove it), but more moving was the frog. (And not just because he's taller than I am). Honestly, I couldn't even believe the beauty of the sculpture. Jeff has these huge strong hands that make spirit soar out of anything with engines or wings. Look, do you think the guy can sculpt?

Emily Dickinson said "Hope is the thing with feathers that perches in the soul, and sings the tune without the words, and never stops at all." When times got tough during my illness and it was clear Menieres would not let me on that bike, Jeff and I sold it. Still a contender, it has won the Motogiro De California now several years running. The frog gives me hope every day, leaping up, with such a fluid, expansive stretchiness. What Jeff doesn't know, because his hands just do this, is that the lithe nature he brings out of simple steel rod makes for a feeling of exuberance in the viewer. He touches my life the same way, bringing surprise and liveliness. He's the hare, full of large scale speed, as I am the tortoise, moving slowly, gradually, in my ongoing struggle with gravity. Like many artists, he won't get around to the discussion with galleries, even though he has accompanied me to my shows, openings, exhibits. So now you will find him on Artfire at Artimentary Studios, where you can place an order for his work.

This handsome frog is a reminder, as I proceed with more surgery tomorrow to save what's left of my hearing and ability to walk. Always upward, the stretch is what frees the soul. Even metal bends in the right hands, becomes something bigger. I place my life on a daily basis into The Largest Hands of all. But, here's one small but big thing to do for frogs: stop use of RoundUp and other 'green washed' household and garden products that truly endanger frogs and other amphibians. We can't all sculpt like Jeff Lindsey, but we can reduce chemicals that compromise their immune system, as well as leave habitat intact where they can hold on. We need frogs. I need frogs. What helps you hold on to hope?

Art meets Truth

Art doesn't lie. Unlike humans, with necessary defenses, art is not deceptive. What's there is there, for all to see. It is why I love it, but why it takes courage to make it. Especially at some turns of our lives. Art is like the mirror to the moon of Truth, as in this piece, Willamette Moon. I was struggling with details, but had to step back to see the compositional integrity. True also in the composition of my life, day to day. My challenge? to be mindful in the little things, yet wear Life as a loose garment. I know I am not alone in this. The artwork got it's space to breathe from the dialog between detail and the larger compositon. We have to weigh and work with these contrasts.

While making my own artwork, I have also worked for over 26 years as an art therapist. My population has been very young traumatized children who have seen the underbelly of a changing America (living in meth labs, suffering abuse from adult addiction, maltreatment, the works). When people ask I tell them these are resilient children; they live beyond the ugly things done to them, and have the courage to grow on and grow up every day in the hidden war zone of our country. Few people see their amazing successes. My colleagues and I find it hard and rewarding work.

A colleague stopped me yesterday, and gave me the gift of Truth. He came and sat a moment, confronting me with gentle, steady notice of my decline in ability to walk, crawling along the walls, life with Meniere's Disease. Its been my personal enemy. The bain I've fought, that slowly takes me further from the front lines where younger troups needed help to suit up and show up in this daily siege for renewing hope. He said simply: "We see you. You have not given up. But we see that you suffer. Antonia, you are disabled." It is true. I cannot walk for days at a time, or even sit up. After 8 years of this, trying everything to stay upright, I still cannot mentally or physically outrun the decline, the nausea, the hearing loss; surgeries that cut into both sides of my head to rebuild the balance chambers, special diets, physical rehabilitation, learning sign. I live like this found object sculpture, At Sea on Land.
Again what saves me is the Truth. I am disabled in my ability to overcome living in a broken body. But that's not the right job description. It comes to this: "If you wear out your skin house, where are you going to live?" The pace, the push, the American demand that people of skin and bones be replaceable as machines, under estimates what we do that machines don't. We feel, and we mitigate suffering by sharing it and diluting it down, like filtering the sediment from water that it may run clear again. We create out of everything, and nothing. As a therapist, "the trick is to metabolize pain as energy". Artists do this as a way of life. It is what has allowed me to stay in clinical work as long as I have. But art is about truth, always.

I see now that I am this bird, "Fast Bird". My mind reaches for flowers, and my frantic pace is halted, like the bird whose wings hover while suspended between panels. She's caught in the present. As am I. May West said some of us who cannot be a positive role model can at least be a terrible warning. Do not believe the current American myth. Do not believe that faster is better, or more right, or more worthy every time. Fast is an option, like deliberate is an option. Mindful is an option. And when it hurts, stopping has to be an option. Not necessarily a failure. Okay, I am disabled in my ability to move fast. And in my art, I can do anything. Except ignore the truth.
How do you face your truth?

Art meets Discipline

Art is a conversation with others and ourselves. A characteristic of my art is love of detail. Detailed ornamentation brings discipline. Practicing a visual-motor skill, or playing an instrument, gives relief through repetition. In this Gimme World of instant gratification (aka illusions) practice is metaphor about life; it takes time. There is no replacement for this element. If repetition is the language of love, loving the work to better our craft is to love our art. Being disciplined in art is a living process.

Discipline is not a dirty word. Take the world-class Japanese garden nearby. The visitor is surrounded by discipline pointing at nature, the Master. The garden works as a dialog of details; a conversation between the artist-gardener and Life. It's a painting but alive, slowly changing with each leaf on the path or splash that ripples the water. The details are planned to include what's spontaneous. Living art. I take this lesson to heart as a lover of the handmade life, making small homages in my own garden.

There is a place for spontenaity in all this practice. Steampunk art that nods to methods used a century ago lets me play with purpose. When you look closely at the watchworks and salvaged pieces, much of the fabrication and craftsmanship holds up handsomely over time. For those unfamiliar with some of the tools used, here is an engravers block, a common fixture of watchmakers, hand engravers and jewelers. I am actually amazed that these haven't changed in 30 years or more. My metalsmithing teacher was Max Nixon, trained in the American Arts & Crafts movement. He first introduced me to hand engraving. Max was a fixture (and feature) of the Fine & Applied Arts Department of the School of Architecture & Allied Arts at the University of Oregon. And once upon a time (gasp) in those dark ages, machine engraving had not yet totally replaced finely wrought hand engraving. I practiced the basics of making my own gravers, learning Copperplate and other scripts (both forward and in reverse for printing press use), and thought I'd blind myself working on lacertine patterns I fell for studying Celtic hand-illuminated gospels of the 9-11th centuries. (Speaking of practice, you did notice I said hand-illumination, the ultimate discipline of transcribing gospel texts letter by letter!) Lacertine patterns have since gained such popularity we see them in broad circulation on everything from metal to skin. Funny how all things old become new again!

Back to steampunk, discipline and time. Since I can't really feel time until it accumulates past all reason (there are people who can attest to this) the discipline of learning fastidious, nitpicky things takes hold of me hard. I'm older than dirt and still in love with persnickety processes while I play at the variety of things emerging from Artimentary Studios. Here is a Steampunk Medal underway for gothic musician "Luna's Ceiling" (see the moon with clouds of titanium slag?) We're naming it the "Cordon Black" as he also cooks. I'm still working on it so I'll let you know how it turns out.
A final point about art and discipline: don't let processes or details scare you off. Not everything comes overnight. In this madhouse of a Sudden-Success-Or-You're-Nothing culture, art still teaches us reason, devotion and discipline regardless of the direction expressed. Look, SOMETHING has to! So sweat away, loving the devil in the details of every exhaspirating or exhilerating moment of the handmade life.
Maybe its just what we do.

Art meets Vows

When you're ready to make your vows, why not make your rings? There are many methods available: jewelry artists who are trained as design jewelers can help when you have a theme in your heart even if you can't draw or picture the rings. This is not rocket science, it's applied art and craftsmanship! The key is finding jewelers who listen well (not coerce you into pre-existing patterns), who design, and who have experience using a variety of metalsmithing techniques. You want help to customize this visual story about your relationship. What you're looking for is to explore metal and stones beyond the typical diamond wedding set mentality. This is where a design jeweler can help you have the same comfort you would insist on if you were going to wear a second skin. It matters! Don't just go to the mall!

The bride and groom's family wanted to honor their determined relationship of 10 years by gathering family heirlooms to recycle the metal and stones, as well as the history behind them. The groom's ring features inlaid mokume gane, a Japanese technique of married metals, set in 18 karat white gold. Mokume gane is an exceptional delight to the eye, offering effects similar to woodgrain, or the play of ripples on water. It is also quite a statement about one metal next to another: contrast can be dramatic or subtle, depending on the metals used. (Not a bad metaphor for people getting married). We found special stock at Reactive Metals which suited the groom's purposes. He was guided through the construction of his ring from carving the wax for a lost wax vacuum casting, to soldering the inlay of mokume gane in place before final polishing of his sleek and very individual ring.

The bride had a deep connection to her great grandmother's 6 karat lavendar star sapphire. A high cut cabachon, it was originally set in a classic princess Di style surrounded with diamond pave. The ring went through a second incarnation when it was redesigned in 18 k yellow gold, highly architectural shape with channel set diamonds. For her own turn, the bride yearned for something organic, fluid, and graceful, with an Art Nouveau feel but strength that would still balance the considerable weight of the high stone to reduce rolling on her finger. She was leery of prongs due to activity and opted for a gypsy setting to afford protection and add to the fluidity of the design. Her sketches suggested floral stems and leaves which were loosely interpreted in white gold.


1. rough cast 18 karat white gold mounting






2. cleaned up casting with side mounted diamonds

















3. and the final center stone set and polished!

The rings figured prominantly in the overall handmade nature of this wedding. But best of all, the process of making them was as important as the symbols. If you are in the Pacific Northwest, and have not yet met Tim Green of Timothy W. Green Jewelers and Jo Gentry Haemer of Gentry Goldsmithing, check out their classes for design jewelery instruction extraordinaire. Care about the process, and enjoy the product even more. If we make vows, why not also invoke these promises as we marry intentions in the metal? Art, like relationships, is not just a thing, it IS a way. What could be a more wonderful way to celebrate a marriage?

Art meets Time

Time is a sensory thing. I can't feel it passing like other people. I only know it by the sensory activity in which I'm engaged. Making art gives me complete suspension of any temporal movement. When I was on a sailboat, I only felt time by experiencing the moon. If we neared the shore this was marked by tides. This image, Time or Tide: What Moves You, is what time felt like at sea. Since living aboard a sailboat and returning to land, I was diagnosed with Meniere's Disease, impairing my balance and hearing. It amounts to being seasick on land. Or the feeling of falling out of a helicopter though your feet are still on the ground. Perplexing, and nauseating. Though after surgeries I can now walk again, the hearing impairment it caused is progressive. Episodes happen off and on, leaving me lying at a horizontal incline of between 16-45 degrees for several hours or up to a couple of days. When you cannot move, time is altered. It is how I began bead crochet for my reUse jewelry (artimentary.etsy.com). I was seeking a way to make art when I couldn't see because of nystagmus. I couldn't change the tilt of my head because of vertigo. Fighting with gravity for no reason is irrational, so surrender was a necessity. Like seasickness, your reasoning may tell you that you are safe in a bobbing vessel, but your body can still object all it wants to, behaving as if you are nothing but a cork about to be swept into oblivion. It's all about perception. Back to the time thing: when bedridden for a year, time becomes either a preoccupation or a nonsequetor. When my world was too full of discomfort, art gave beauty back through the texture of beads, which let me experience tiny passing moments, that turned to ropes, which pulled me eventually back upright. Once upright, this image of nighttime at sea emerged. It is my metaphor for when time was only measured in swells, and darkness was the deep indigo of a wet world. I share it with you in hopes that your time of depth will be as fruitful for you as mine was, and is, for me. Nothing is wasted. Time, however we experience it, moves like the tide.

Art meets Egg

Spring brings everything back up out of the dark. The garden at Artimentary Studios beckons us outside...see the Redroom? Indoors, the internal landscape takes shape as we hold Eggamas (our Easter, Spring Equinox, and general family celebration). In our family, a loose and fluid term around here, each of us has very different imagery. We batik our eggs; they are not painted.
Traditional Pysansky tools and methods are used, but we adapt and expand designs from different sources. Ariel's work is exciting and modern, though she is very reverent of the historic craft. She comments "After 10 years I'm still only starting to get across some results I like in this medium. Maybe if I do this throughout my life, I might someday have a bit of the precision and delicate composition seen in the traditional artists. They do this each day for hours and there is no way to match that kind of discipline."
Marieke works like she draws; her pieces remind me of sufism. She works from her interior, and symbols seem to call to her on their own. Her rendering is always unique.







Jeff, as a sculptor, finds the boney surface of the eggs as a ground for the dyes to be unpredictable and somewhat frustrating. But check out the textural quality and impressionistic color! Sumptuous.
We get a great mood going, huddling around the dyes in the scent of natural beeswax candles. We heat our tools, dipping them into traditional wax, which is guided on to block out the design, applying each layer, alternating with dyes revealing a composition done in reverse. Conversation is leisurely and lively. Unexpected egg events occur throughout the process, from blowing them out, all the way to rubbing off the wax at the end to unveil the batiked patterns. The trick is to accept some Raku ("happy accident") along the way. The point is the doing, as in yoga. This one by Ariel actually looks like robin yoga.
Mine are always about praying with my hands, sinking my mind into nature, digging for beauty, composting suffering, planting gratitude. For me it's all about the big prayer, as Anthony Bloom (a greek orthodox bishop) calls it: "Thank you". So here is my namaste, Eggamaste, to you! What art calls to you this spring?

Art meets Tech: about Balance!

Tho an introvert, I'm friendly and curious, which is what makes art so compelling. I wander the world of matter with my hands and eyes (being a visual artist & jeweler). Musicians, you do this with hands and ears. Point being: I love to learn about SME and tech stuff to help me connect, but I have to be selective. The way electronic media work on my visual cortex impact me heavily. I am quite overstimulated, and have to use Timothy Adams' Handmadeology tips from his Etsysecrets course carefully, and sparingly. I have to explore, then soak in. Then make Art at it, to stay in balance. What guides your intersection of art-making with social media?

Handmadeology -- great help for artists

I'm sold on Tim Adam's sites and teaching info for artists. If you haven't visited Handemadeology it is worth the trip. I haven't had such useful, concise, and user friendly technical assistance ever. What a relief and a gracious approach. Very inspiring. Hope you'll consider it!

art at it!

when the making is on, it's ON. what are you making out of our upside down economy? now is the time to rethink the whole deal. Start with what's at hand! Here's my idea: we all knew things would have to go back to zero to turn the old ways on end. If we play at this, the inspiration will bloom. here's to a hearty spring cleaning and just think what can be made new!

Welcome to Artimentary!