Artistic Inspiration

Enamel earrings inspired by the color of Bradford Pear leaves.

In “Colorful Colorado” nature imposes herself on our senses throughout the year. We are blessed with a kaleidoscope of continuous change and vitality. We watch nearly in awe as our mountains and our prairie transition from season to season, from arid to lush, lifeless to effervescent, in an endless story of birth and resurrection. But for those of us lucky enough to possess one in our yard, of all of nature’s showpieces and specimens, none surpasses the majestic Bradford Pear in her display of colors and natural hues.

In the spring our Bradford Pear explodes into a massive tuft of cotton candy, urgently demanding our attention before an errant breeze can scatter her blossoms across the lawn like driven snow. Summer’s warmth brings forth her foliage, so dense that it conceals the space it occupies, affording a canopy of shade to the lawn, nesting spaces for birds, and refuge for squirrels.  When fall arrives, the pear expends the energy that she has hoarded throughout the summer. It is as if her leaves attempt to re-bloom, as she becomes a palette for a thousand shades of yellow, burning into orange, then crimson, then copper. Then finally, exhausted and spent, her leaves take flight with the first winter blast, to reveal the silhouette of her limbs in a pointillist sea of tiny sugar pears that remain to sustain her resident birds and squirrels throughout the winter.

The Bradford Pear leaves us not only with memories of her grandeur, but also with artistic inspiration. If only to capture one single moment of her glorious transition - into jewelry! I waited breathlessly for the radiance of the kiln to subside, and for the glow of the enamel to “fit” itself into its final glaze, to know if I had been able to replicate that instant when she “bloomed” her final golden farewell to this season. 

This pair of dangle earrings holds true to the promise of enamel jewelry for its beautiful color and gorgeous, glossy finish.

Unique Jewelry Findings

Enamel Earring Findings

        One of the most rewarding aspects of art is when one’s work acquires an entirely new dimension when placed in the hands of a fellow artist. Let me explain:

          I describe my own designs as inspired by the art deco and nouveau periods in modern art. The notion of beauty and uniqueness combined with functionality has always been my goal. So I was flattered when a fellow Etsy seller, after seeing some of my dangle earrings, contacted me to inquire if I would consider creating enamel findings that other jewelers could combine with their own designs. Imagine my delight when I realized that Soleil of Sunrise Treasures creates beautiful and colorful bohemian and southwest motif jewelry.

          Who would pass up such an adventure into new shapes and colors? No longer was I creating entirely from my own internal design library, but relying on another artist to interpret and finish the work using her own artistic notions. Please take a peek at Soleil’s first pair of chandelier earrings made from my enamel earring components!

Chandelier Earrings by OxArtJewelry

         

 It has been such fun (like watching your children in the staring role in the school play!) that I have decided to open a new section in OxArtJewelry to offer an assortment of unique jewelry findings and components to other jewelry artists. With a little help from our friends, the artist can indeed explore new dimensions. 

Mixed Metal Jewelry Collection

Ox Art Jewelry Mixed Metals Collection

When we formulate our thoughts, we reach into our vocabulary to find the right words to give them context, meaning and nuance. In the same way, the artist uses tools like color, texture, line and shape to communicate her ideas.

But how do you express, artistically, notions like simplicity? Effortlessness? Versatility? Or timelessness? These are the kinds of things the modern woman wants to express in her lifestyle – so different from the ornate, over-embellished, and sometimes gaudy designs of the past.

So I gave myself a challenge, to produce a new collection while keeping certain words in mind. Modern. Simple. Fresh. Sleek. Versatile. They seem to demand neutrality in color, clean lines, natural finishes, and uncomplicated, aesthetic shapes.

The result is my Mixed Metal Jewelry Collection. I think of it as a clean, easy and modern style. It seeks to both define and to streamline that lifestyle in constant motion without attracting undue attention to itself.

Leaves Layering Necklace by Ox Art Jewelry

Nature's Paintbrush

January Colorado Sunset

A few Moments Earlier

"Mother Nature has taken out her paintbrush again..." I said to the person driving the car, as I pointed to the sunset and reached for my camera. "And what a beautiful palette!" Mindlessly, I said these things to that slavish reader of Discover Magazine, memorizer of scientific factoids, analyzer of natural phenomena, rejecter of all things mystical and magical: my husband. Without even pausing to consider the inevitable scientific explanations.
He did not disappoint.
"Nonsense." He said. "Colorado sunsets over the prairie are beautiful because the physics of sunlight works well here."
Told you.
"Of course," I humored him. "And everyone knows that the skies are redder at sunset than at sunrise because…" Here he would normally complete the sentence for me. He disappointed.
"… because," I labored on.… "…because of that train whistle effect? Don’t they call it red-shifting?" It made sense to me. You know, as the earth spins towards the sun in the morning and away in the evening?
"You mean the doppler effect?" Now he did not disappoint, completing my thought. "That only works with sound. Applying it to sunlight would contradict Einstein’s theory of relativity, which requires that light travel at a universally constant speed without regard to the motion of the observer."
Quickly, before my eyes could glaze over, I snapped another picture.
I flashed him an indulgent little smile, then plodded on. "Of course. Everyone knows that sunsets are caused by all that stuff in the atmosphere, aerosols, pollution, particles…" even though I sensed his lack of conviction, still I soldiered on. "… and because the air is warmer, and more humid in the evenings than in the early morning." Did I also mention that he is a stoic? I saw his head nodding slightly forward in a kind of grim determination not to disagree with any of my continuing observations. So I gave him my summation: "I just wanted to see if you were paying attention."
"Think rainbows," He offered. His patient inner professor had found its voice. "Think how, after a rain, the water droplets in the air scatter and bend sunlight into its various wavelengths like a prism, which our eyes interpret as color. When the sun is on the horizon its light must travel through many more miles of Earth’s atmosphere than when it is overhead. It scatters the shorter blue frequencies, causing the sky to appear blue, and leaves only the red for us to see on the horizon. And since, on the Great Plains, clouds almost always form in the west in the evening, they provide a dense canvas for…?"
I refused to help him out. I just wanted to hear him say it. I continued snapping photos, capturing every swirl of Mother Nature’s hand.