| As a professional
designer, educated at the University of Manitoba's Faculty of
Architecture, I’ve explored many different media and have
found my passion in creating Fine Art Beadwork and jewellery fashioned
from sterling silver, often incorporating gorgeous beads.
I am continually inspired by the tactile nature of beads, the
endless texture and colour stories that can be created with them,
and the complex artistic possibilities they offer. Each time I
discover a new bead or object to incorporate into my work is joyous,
and creates a burst of creative thought processes.
The Fine Art Beadwork that I create is extremely labour intensive,
requiring countless hours per piece to sew on each bead one or
two at a time -- I find the process to be very meditative, and
each finished piece is truly a labour of Love, artistic expression,
and creativity. I am inspired by many things around me, both tangible
and intangible: light; water; patterns, textures, and colours
in nature; mothering; the strength and resilience of the soul;
and the physical, emotional, spiritual aspects of the human experience.
Using a torch to soften, bond, and melt, hammers, saws, files,
and other glorious tools to shape and form sterling silver into
one-of-a-kind pieces of jewellery, my passion for beads occasionally
finds its way into these personal adornments. I incorporate a
carefully selected rainbow of beautiful, high quality beads into
earrings, bracelets, rings, and neckwear.
The beads used in my jewellery are greatly varied in shape,
colour, material, and size. A few of the wonderful treasures I
have the great joy of utilising include: semiprecious stones from
all corners of the earth; fairly traded hand-made sterling silver
beads from Bali, and from the Karen Hill Tribes; one-of-a-kind
hand made glass lampwork from talented, self-representing artists;
fresh water pearls; Swarovski® Crystals from Austria; antiques
from Europe; glass from Czechoslovakia, Japan, and Venice; and
organic gems such as amber, Paua shell, mother of pearl, and abalone.
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