Archive for February, 2007
Four Corners
Wednesday, February 7th, 2007
16 x 20 Acrylics, sand, thick gel medium on stretched canvas, frame unnecessary
Inspired by the Four Corners area of the western U.S., where the rocks and soil vary rich shades of red, and turquoise has been treasured and utilized by North American native tribes for centuries.
Pre-columbian Jaguar Beads
Thursday, February 1st, 2007
1. The tray 2. The beads 3. A picture of the orginal necklace.
The beads are made of Polymer clay, a permanent material once baked, acrylic paints, varnish, tray refurbished and paper-mached, painted and varnished for durability.
I was drawn immediately to this Pre-columbian Mayan necklace upon seeing a photo of it, and would love to own it, so tried to make one. The original necklace of gold jaguar head-shaped beads, made over 500 years ago, was discovered in a lord’s tomb in Guatemala.
Like much of the pre-historic and tribal Art that looks crude or seems like it should be easy to recreate, there is a lot more here than meets the eye. One of the things that’s so enjoyable about a project like this is experiencing the same design dilemmas that the original Artist must have encountered. There is a lot of engineering in that simple-looking necklace. I think the goldsmith who created the orginal might have used a mold, because each individual jaguar head-shaped bead needs to be identical, and so do the small round ones in order to string the beads together and obtain the uniform semi-circle shape. Mine were indivudually shaped, less than perfect, and did not fit together well unfortunately.
I may make another attempt at the necklace, but for now the peices are placed on a useful tray as if a moment in time is recaptured; the moment when this necklace was being created by the original Artist. The refurbished tray is covered with paper-mache, painted and varnished. Durable, useful, hand wash gently to clean.