“Cradling the Cosmos”
Pit fired ceramics, pine needle basketry, lava beads, crystal chips, rhodonite beads, glass seed beads and artificial sinew.
Approx. size – 21″ x 21″ x 9 1/2″ tall
As soon as I began weaving on this wonderful base I felt like I was looking down into a deep picture of space. There are such wonderful explosions of color mixed with pits of blackness just as it is in space. As I worked, I knew I could create a reflection as in water, but the desire to cradle this microcosm of galaxy became my driving force, as if to capture and hold it for eternity. The weaving lends itself to swirling gases and the final embellishment of rocks and stones complete the feeling of space’s cast offs.
2,575 USD
Free shipping in the Continental USA
“Fluidity”
Pit fired ceramics, pine needle basketry, red jasper, hemalyke and glass beads, devil’s claws, saguaro twin boot and driftwood.
Approx. size – 20″ x 16″ x 8″ tall
This polished ceramic base has such a wonderful glassy feel to it and received some outstanding markings during its pit firing. I wanted to mimic those markings and what better way than with Huichol beading? The beading has such a fluid feeling about it as though it could spill out of the vessel at any moment. The basket portion carries on this feeling of something flowing as the strands dip up and down and intertwine with each other. Perhaps all this motion is what caught and trapped a corner full of nature’s treasures; from an old piece of beautifully sanded driftwood to the devil’s claws and saguaro double boot… all embellished by the use of wired beads which spring forth from the boot’s center. Each portion of this sculpture flows into the next element giving the viewer a sense of calm and serenity.
2,800 USD
Free shipping in the Continental USA
“Angel Wings”
Pit fired ceramics, pine needle weaving, mookaite jasper, brass, drift wood
Approx. size – 9″ x 9″ x 8″
I’ve never been very good at working small and this sweet little basket is the final success of working in the small. I’m use to big, elaborate basket sculptures where you have all the room in the world to tell your story. The lesson here was, less is more. The ceramic portion is actually the result of pit firing it twice and I’m so happy I did the second firing as I was rewarded with some really extraordinary colors and flashes! The mookaite jasper beads had been languishing in my stash of goodies for years and years and as always, the perfect piece appears one day that makes two objects look as though they were created for each other. I love it when that happens! My final struggle was a finishing piece. I tried every beloved found object from nature that I have in my studio – nothing worked. In frustration, I took a walk out on my patio and what do you know, I just happened to look on a high shelf of the patio baker’s rack and what do you think I found? The most perfect little piece of driftwood that nestled itself right down into the top crook of the basket. It reminded me of wings when I first picked it up and because of how I found it in my frustration, what better title than “Angel Wings”?
1,200 USD
Free shipping in the Continental USA
“Reaching Back for Earth”
Pit fired ceramics, pine needle weavings, natural and found objects
Approx. size – 21″ x 21″ x 14″t
Reaching Back for Earth took me nearly a year to complete. I’m always shocked when so much time goes by so quickly. One of my larger baskets and I love how both the inside and outside of the ceramics portions contain so many mysteries. The outside reflects the many, many small pieces of clay that were joined together in either coils or discs with voids in many places. I love that you literally have to pick it up and look as much at the sides and bottom as you do the inside. I love secret surprises. An undulating basket weaving nestles earthly treasures, holding them tight so as not to let them slip back through the holes and be claimed by mother earth once more.
3,000 USD
“Twisted Fate”
Pit fired ceramics, pine needles, deer antler, fire agate, landscape stone, stone, wood, metal, fresh water pearls and glass beads.
Approx. size – 18 1/2″ x 17″ x 8 1/2″
The process of a basket sculpture is predictable in the methods used to create it, but that is as far as predictable gets. From the first choice of how and where to attach the first row of weaving, to the pattern the weaving will take, to the gathering and application of the perfect finishes, each step is dependent on the one before. A final embellishment might be wished for when gazing at the lone ceramic base before any weaving has begun, but rarely has that element been incorporated into the finished piece.
My material supply is large and varied in its shapes, colors, textures and sources. Some materials are man made while others, nature has provided. Some are even natural materials that man has enhanced, reshaped, and polished to bring out their intense beauty, such as the stone beads gathered up in this basket. The large orange fire agates are a particular favorite of mine in this piece. They have a crackled quality to them, a natural veining that is just beautiful – qualities that only man could have brought forth through tumbling and shaping.
The pit fired ceramic base holds an amazing range of firing colors on the interior, while the bottom has very little coloring other than gray smoking marks. It is the top side colors that drove the final elements that were chosen to showcase what nature had done in the pit firing.
And so, in the end, it is a twist of fate that all the components are brought together, one breathing something more into the next one, while making the previous one “pop” as it would not have done without the next element. “Twisted Fate” is a layering of nature to celebrate earth’s glorious colors.
1,725 USD
Free Shipping in Continental USA
