April Higashi // NEW WORK

April Higashi // Artist Statement

The world of craft is a surreal place after the birth of my son last year. Before that momentous occasion, the space of making held more weight in my life. Now, though it is still important to me, it is met with a feeling of lightness. I am sometimes haunted by how to merge motherhood with making and my daily efforts to create new work are approached through a foggy veil. The many days and weeks spent creating these pieces where dedicated to unearthing a complexity from a chaos of new ideas that have occupied my mind and my studio. Hopefully when resolved and finished the works retain a mysterious presence and offer a space for peace and stillness. The enamels and fossilized coral pieces in this group capture this feeling of solace.

The abstract imagery painted in my enamels in the past emerged after snorkeling in Hawaii above the natural coral reefs. Swimming above the majestic beauty, I did not want to directly copy what I saw but instead convey the feelings experienced as I looked at the forms and moved through the water. This group of work is more direct, as coral-like branches are rendered to appear as if captured in a mist. The images are painted in layers using graphite, enamel and china paint. They are partially hidden creating an atmosphere of distance that asks the viewer to leave them to exist in their own quiet suspended space. I have accented these pieces with prong set diamond slice fragments, black diamonds and rose cut moonstones. The beads are French steel cut beads from the 1930's that add an eccentricity rooted in fashionable jewelry of this era. I have used bead setting as a reference to this antique jewelry, yet left surfaces smooth and sculptural.

This is a time for more awareness of our resources and greater efforts in recycling these objects of beauty. Reflecting my appreciation for nature, the pearls, coral, moonstones and diamonds in this group were bought from sustainable sources. The pearls are special fresh water American pearls harvested from the Tennessee River mostly from mussels. This second generation family business has spent over 50 years collecting pearls from our rivers and lakes. The dome pearls were originally used as a test for making cultured pearls. I have bought the remainder of this company's supply of these pearls. The companies that harvest the coral take only dead coral that is no longer feeding other species of sea life. The brilliant cut diamonds were bought from older estate jewelry. As a jewelry maker l bring my interpretation with the hope that there will always be a desire for a new perspective both in fashion and art.

                  'Ma' Brooch, painted enamel, diamond slices, 18k yellow gold, oxidized silver

('Ma' is not something that is created by compositional elements; it is the thing that takes place in the imagination of the human who experiences these elements.It is best described as a consciousness of place, not in the sense of an enclosed three-dimensional entity, but rather the simultaneous awareness of form and non-form deriving from an intensification of vision.)

The show is up at Gallery Lulo through 7/30/11. The new work will be shown at Shibumi Gallery opening November 5th, 2011 with an extension of this series. This will be the first solo show at Shibumi of April's work since she opened Shibumi in 2005.

Darcy Miro at Shibumi Gallery

review by Ahna Adair

Since she began her art practice, Darcy Miro has covered an extensive territory with her metalwork. Her ability to adapt to various art markets is noteworthy, operating within the fields of fashion, design, art jewelry, and sculpture. Comfortable dwelling in the minute and the gigantic, her resume lists high profile projects such as her participation in the façade design of the American Folk Art Museum in 2001 with architects Tod Williams and Billie Tsien.

Pierce and Stripe Cuff, 2011, oxidized silver, black diamonds, 2.5"x 3"x 2"

The collection showing at Shibumi Gallery consists primarily of pendants and cuffs with some earrings and rings interspersed. Their arrangement on a white exhibition table brings attention to the specimen like quality of the work and peering down at over 50 small abstract forms is not unlike a visit to the natural history museum. A slight break in continuum from her raw and imperfect aesthetic happens with the pendants strung on smooth black ribbon. Here the viewer is plainly reminded that these objects function as pieces of adornment.
 

Medium Pendant Seven, 2011, oxidized silver, black ribbon, 1.75" x 3.25"

vWhile the work is a cohesive body of jewelry, Miro does not identify as a jeweler, preferring instead the broader title of metal sculptor. Balancing between the mark of nature and that of the maker, her forms are intuitively constructed, translated first into wax and then cast in sterling silver and 18k yellow gold. The majority of the pieces in the show, far from pristine and highly polished, are treated with a dark patina, leaving solder and scorched metal exposed.

Short Stitch Cuff, 2011, oxidized silver, black diamonds, 2.5"x 3"x 2"

Her rich textures, referencing nature, architecture and the body, are a sultry marriage of the primordial and the high tech; what once was becomes tangled with what is. Each piece functions as a fleeting moment, a snapshot of the artist’s psyche as her conscious and unconscious observations of the day-to-day spill out onto the wax to eventually be made permanent in metal. Subtly sprinkled with black diamonds, the familiar sparkle acts as a sugarcoating as if to assure us that what we are looking at is beautiful. And it is.

Wire Tie Ring, 2011, oxidized silver, black diamonds, 1" x 1" x 1"

Miro’s upcoming projects include installations at E.L. Butler in NYC, Art Basel in Miami and a large wall relief in Abu Dhabi.

Ahna Adair is a jeweler, artist and writer based in Oakland, CA.

Raissa Bump: "Circulation"

The artist's musings on her current body of work followed by a conversation with the artist.

There is something so irresistible in the prospect of tying up loose ends and making honest work out of our starts and stutters. It’s an urge that permeates across disciplines and vocations. At some point we’ve all yearned to find a home for our unfinished things, a place where they can rest and in turn put our mind at rest. Raïssa Bump has taken this simple urge and expanded on it, creating a complex body of work that utilizes her unfinished bits and pieces, collected over a 20-year period, in combinations to make brooches, earrings, and necklaces.

But this work is more than just sorting out old projects and sifting through unfinished endeavors. In an intricate collaboration with herself, this body of jewelry collages together pieces made by the artist at varying stages along her journey as a maker. Pieces from the 7-year old Raïssa combine with those from the 27-year old Raïssa and as if before your eyes, they become new again. She has thoughtfully folded in each part with skill and sophistication, allowing each new piece to stand on it’s own. The end result is a body of jewelry, both edgy and elegant.

In complement to this current project, the show includes a selection of Bumps knitwear. Working back and forth within jewelry and knitwear, Bump engages in a constant conversation between these two dynamic segments of her studio practice. Her humble yet sexy garments hang in the gallery as a backdrop, illustrating her complete vision of adornment as a vehicle for non-verbal communication and self-expression.

Raïssa Bump received her B.F.A. in Jewelry and Metals at Rhode Island School of Design and studied at Alchimia School of Contemporary Jewelry in Florence Italy. She has taught at various colleges including the revered Penland School of Crafts and locally at Diablo Valley College. I had the opportunity to talk with her about her practice and her current body of work being shown at Shibumi Gallery in Berkeley. Read what Raïssa has to say about her current show, “Circulation” and then go see the work.

One of the last things that we were talking about at your opening was sketching in 3-dimensions with tangible objects vs. making an actual drawing and you said that it was difficult for you to get ideas out by planning on paper. On the other hand there are artists who need that plan or blueprint before they can begin to make a piece. So, what is it about that type of artist production that is more fruitful for you?

Probably because, in one way, my skills with drawing are not as developed but that’s besides the point because I think if drawing felt right to me I would find ways to make it more of an outlet. I certainly don’t feel like I need a blueprint before I start. Regardless of where the idea is, I like to have a tangible beginning point and then just work from there and evaluate as I go along.

I work through my hands. That’s where my spirit connects. I think it’s how I experience life too. It’s more about the experience and being able to see it instead of just imagine it. I can respond a lot more to that. And for me it’s harder to make decisions if something doesn’t already exist. I find that I can be more responsive and have a clearer idea about a piece when I’m brainstorming in 3-dimensions. And after all, the end result is a 3-dimensional thing. That’s probably why I have so many leftovers.

Right, instead of a sketchbook you probably have boxes and piles and things like that.

Yeah, its gives me more information. For the most part, I sketch after I already have an idea I’m working out in 3-dimensions and I say to myself, “before I go to the next stage I’m going to draw this out in different sizes so I can get a visual. Or I cut it out in paper. Paper is more tactile.

So then, along those lines how do you know when you’re finished? How do you know when you have reached the end product so to speak?

That’s not always so direct and so easy. I have a table where I have bits and pieces that I’ll arrange in a composition. I’ll leave it like that for a day or maybe I’ll move it around or add something else and feel it out. It’s a lot of intuition, of allowing time. It doesn’t always happen fast. I look at a composition for a while and then I start putting it together, actually constructing it. Eventually I wear it around my studio and sometimes out on the streets. I have to put it on the body and see how it wears, see how I feel in it, see how it looks when I walk in front of a mirror or if it hangs strange. I actually, especially with this body of work, make a lot of little changes at this stage. So, it’s a process of allowing enough time for each piece.

So, then are you kind of working in between pieces, going back and forth or do you tend to focus on one piece until you get it right and then move on to the next?

Rarely do I work on one piece and then go to the next and then the next. In my general process I have many pieces going on at once and it allows me to not get stressed out. Some pieces end up being something and some ideas don’t for the moment. It makes more sense to allow that time that I was talking about in order to feel the work intuitively and to keep looking at it at different moments, different moods, different times of day, different light…

The title of this show is “Circulation”. Would you in general talk a little bit about Circulation and what that means to your work?

I like the idea of this continuous motion. That was one of the things I responded to when choosing the title, this cycle and idea that one thing leads to the next in an ongoing, continuous flow. So that’s how I viewed it as I was working. It was this process of looking at myself throughout different time periods of my life and addressing that. As people, we interact with the world and we can’t avoid flow. One thing leads to the next, leads to the next and our experiences lead us to where we are today. So circulation is a reference to the years, the story, the information, the knowledge and interests that went into the work. Also, I like the idea of thinking of circulation in another context, as how things get spread. Like newspaper circulation, how something moves out and about in the world, how it circulates. It feels like that’s where I’m at in my life. I’m putting myself out there in the public and getting the work out there. I really do feel like these necklaces, earrings and brooches are lyrical collages that speak to all the different fragments of me, but at the same time can move away from me and mean something to someone else.

Right. I like that double meaning. The circulation that deals with the making of the work as well as the physical circulation of the work itself once out in the world. Especially because it is unique to a discipline like jewelry. You could make a 2-d work or a sculpture for that matter but it would be on the wall or somewhere more permanent. But jewelry is so interesting in that it’s constantly moving through the day to day.

Yeah, which is lovely. It moves from mood to mood, space to space and person to person. Jewelry does go to museums or certain places and just stay put but not in general.

As artists we tend to scrutinize what we make all the time. If I were to look back at something that I didn’t consider part of my artwork I might not care so much but when I put things in this category of, “This is my art,” then it becomes so much more magnified. I was thinking of myself going through your process and I wondered, would I want to look at pieces or parts or things that I made 15 or 20 years ago?

It’s interesting too, because some of it dates back to when I was young or even through high school when I wasn’t thinking of it in the context of, “I’m making art.” It was just that pure love of using my hands, getting time to myself and quietly doing all these intricate and repetitive things. Then on top of that, having something as a result of that time spent. I love that. I always like having nothing in my hands and then creating something, and realizing, “Wow, now I have a necklace to wear out tonight or a hat because its cold,” and having that skill is something I really am thankful for.

However, there is a time when it did start to become a harder process. For me the critical moment when it shifted was after college, when I was trying to make money and make this my thing. As far as the pieces I made during this time period, I probably took them apart so much that they are in disguise from what they originally were. They weren’t so interesting to me the way they were.

You said at the gallery talk that your household was a little chaotic and you looked forward to these times when you could steal away by yourself. In terms of this group of work I like picturing what your household was like and I was wondering if you could just give me a little bit of a background on your upbringing?

Sure. I certainly got along with my family. It’s just that I had 3 older brothers and a younger sister. We didn’t have a set routine every single day. It was just sort of, whatever needed to happen, happened. So there was a lot of flexibility in some ways and a lot of unknowns. I found myself wanting quiet time. So I would get away and do my own thing for a while. And that’s what it felt like—getting away from a constant motion.

Was that part of your parents philosophy, that flexibility?

I think that my family was willing to avoid making things super static, which I really appreciate. There were certainly rules and some formality about things. But there was rarely a time where it was just, “This is what it is and no matter what the scenario comes up, I’m not going to consider anything else.” That allowed for a lot to happen. It’s interesting because the house was always changing. We were fixing the house, furniture would move around and in a sense there was a lot of creation.

I was wondering if you had one piece out of the group that especially spoke to you and if you could elaborate.

It’s not so easy to just pick one but I really like the way this piece came out. I feel like it can be worn in different ways. I wore it with a t-shirt and thought it looked great and it felt really good. It also can be dressy and formal. A lot of this exhibition is versatile like that. In this necklace, there is a beautiful interaction between the old and the new. From afar you see it’s line quality and then up-close you see these different elements of texture and color. I like the color interaction in the piece. It’s subdued but still feels very expressive yet very simple.

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Julia Turner: Notation

above brooch: Notation, red enamel, wood, paint, steel

Our current show "Notation" JULIA TURNER features a new body of work focusing on Julia's jewelry and new wall pieces. The work is reminiscent of architectural landscapes and blurred images that reminded me of cityscapes, textiles, and scattered flying birds. The work is black and white accented with a vibrant red; enamel, wood, glass, and red sapphires. Displayed on a cool gray table top in a considered fashion, the show invites you to view from a quiet place and ponder the imagery.

The media is industrial white paint on patinated steel scratched away to form markings and later leaving abstract narrative impressions. As always, Julia's detailing of the work is thoughtful and her execution precise. Each piece is artfully thought out and even the backside including her clasps and attachments, is dealt with with the same kind of precision and care for detail.

above: Julia Turner informal talk at Shibumi / ring: Red Stack Ring, wood, paint, steel

In 2004 Julia and I were exhibiting together at Collect which was hosted by the Victoria and Albert Museum. While walking around the Museum she shared her idea to scratch through white opaque surfaces. Now in this body of work the idea is fully realized. When Julia spoke at Shibumi I mentioned this and she laughed when recalling the unfolding of this process.

Her process in making the pieces involves starting with a large sheet of steel, and scraping shapes and lines according to a feeling connected to the motion, rather than directly composing imagery. She then later scans the sheet for smaller sections which she extracts specifically for their impact when they are viewed within a small boundary. As a jeweler myself it is interesting that she has come up with these techniques to undermine her temptation to scrutinize and perfect everything.

Julia Turner center with wall piece details

Julia Turner's work integrates a painterly quality which is one of the reasons why her pieces are so sought after by collectors. The fact she is transitioning into larger works that forgo the function of wearability seems like a natural progression. Her wall pieces, also on painted on steel, debut at this show.

above brooch: Lookout, steel, wood, 18k gold

Along with the steel painted work Julia shows the wooden stacks with heavy sanding marks. Simple forms become dimensional landscapes and intentional compositional piles. The show is up through June 27th and we continue to show and represent her work year long. To see more of the work along with Julia's wall pieces please visit Shibumi Gallery or inquire for additional show images.

An additional article on the Art Jewelry Forum blog by the artist can be seen here.

above necklace: Black Pile, wood, paint, steel, gray string

above brooch: Satellite, red sapphires, wood, paint, steel, silver

above brooch: Ikat, wood, paint, steel, 18k gold

above pendant: Border, wood, paint, steel

above brooch: Red Fields, wood, paint, steel

above brooch: You Are Here, wood, paint, steel

above brooch: Stripes, wood, paint, steel

above brooch: Break, wood, paint, steel

above necklace: Red Light Strand, faceted glass, wood, paint, steel

above earrings: Storm, paint, steel, 18ky gold / Julia Turner partial show detail

Tina Rath / Jewelry Show

Our current show, Tina Rath / Jewelry has been extended through March 28, 2010.

Tina is currently working on a large scale project Wanderlux: phase I, which premiered at the Institute for Contemporary Art in Portland, Maine in November 2009. And the grand finale: Waderlux: phase II will show with Sienna Gallery at SOFA NY in 2010. It will contain jewelry objects amongst the installation both in view and found in secret drawers.

above: Wanderlux I, Institute for Contemporary Art in Portland, Maine

As long as I've known Tina her projects always come from a personal space. Her work challenges and expands the context of jewelry. This is reflected in the individual pieces as well as the unique contexts she creates to view them in. In Wanderlux she explores finding home, being strongly drawn to nature and being present in the moment. Tina has returned to California through a teaching sabbatical from Maine College of Art, to work on this intensive project. Her love for the outdoors and the beautiful forms of lichen, mushrooms and vastness of nature have enriched her life and play a central role in her current work. 

Shibumi Gallery is currently is featuring her her most wearable and elegant jewelry which is directly influenced by Wanderlux. Similar in feel from the larger scale project, the collector can buy a single brooch or wear them in multiples.

above: Floral Scatterpin, oxidized silver

                                  The forms are made of all natural materials; wood, ivory, fur, antler, gold, quartz and cognac diamonds. 

above: African Blackwood Earrings with Gold Dots, Mushroom Cluster Scatterpins

above: Antler/Mineral brooches, mule deer antler, sterling silver, mink

above: Antler Rossette Brooches with Cognac Diamond and Antler Rosette Brooch with 18ky Dots, Long Fringe Earrings, 18kyg

You can see a brief write up of the show on the Art Jewelry Forum website or better yet come see more of the work in person at Shibumi.