Sylvia Stephen is a resident of Hingham and lives in Linden Ponds. Sylvia received a BA in Fine Arts from the University of Chile. She also studied with Linda Priest at School of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston.
Her Work
Sylvia Stephen creates jewelry in her studio in Waltham, MA. She fuses silver and little pieces of gold, and stampings. With this new technique and semiprecious stones, she forms rings and beads.
Hiroshi Minato grew up in Tokyo and has been a resident of Somerville, Massachusetts since 2001. His endeavor to make jewelry began in 2013 to fulfill his personal needs. He wanted to have a necklace, which could match his outfit and life style. As a result, he decided to make it himself.
His Philosophy
After trying a few materials, he ended up choosing aluminum for his creation. His pieces are asymmetric, however, they are well balanced. They are simple, yet sophisticated. They convey a meaning that can have many interpretations. He thinks that the time and space around the pieces evoke unlimited imagination. He believes that the process makes his pieces unique.
Creative Process
Which are you more interested in? Going to a museum to see paintings, or going to a studio to talk about the creative process? My answer might be the latter one. In fact, my art/design friends and I always enjoy talking about creative processes, not only because we can get a better understanding of our work, but also because we generate new ideas, processes, and designs for our artistic creations. I am a jewelry designer and am delighted to share my creative processes with you. I hope it will be helpful for your future artistic creations.
I use one of two processes in jewelry making. The first is to begin by generating a mental image, a design idea which exists before I ever pick up the materials. The second is to begin with no idea at all, allowing the design to unfold as I work. Let’s talk about the former. I cut a small piece from a roll of aluminum wire and form with it using pliers, a hammer, sandpaper and other tools, according to plan. It’s based on a design idea in my brain. It’s relatively fast as long as the idea is solid. But, how do I come up with these ideas? In fact, design ideas come from almost every part of my life. Sometimes good ideas come about spontaneously while I’m busy with another activity, like swimming. At other times I search for clues in my environment and the objects that inhabit them, for example, historical buildings and Zen gardens. Observing the shapes in architectural and natural forms often works well for my jewelry. They are asymmetric, yet balanced, simple, yet sophisticated. The clues exist not only in sense of sight, but in sense of touch. Going to a fabric store to touch fabrics is a great way to get new ideas about texture, which then serve as tactile inspiration for my next piece.
The latter process is very different because neither a design nor an image is needed. That is, I just cut a piece of wire and then try to feel what the piece wants to be, following the flow. This process is slower and much more interactive. Each movement is an experiment, building upon the one that came before it. It’s very enjoyable. I feel it’s a meditation. I do not expect too much for my results, but more than half of my favorite pieces were created in this way. I do not know what is happening during this process. Scientists might figure it out one day.
After creating new pieces, either by design or creative experimentation, I wait a few days before I look at them again, in order to see them with fresh eyes and check if they suit my style. If they look unique without asserting their uniqueness directly, they are totally great. When I succeed I feel that my pieces create the time and space around them.
I’ve been working in jewelry “seriously” since 2005, making pieces. I began making chainmaille when a magazine project caught my eye and imagination. I had instructions, but still couldn’t make it work. Finally, I sat down and stared at the photo of the finished piece until suddenly, I got it. I saw how the pattern worked, how the rings related to each other. I was hooked. Every chain begins with a pile of rings, and two pair of pliers. I love the challenge of making armor look beautiful, and of finding ways to add beads onto (or into) the weaves. My goal is to push chainmaille beyond the Renaissance Festival, creating pieces that can be worn and appreciated by women everywhere.
I start with the cabochon, playing with the colors until I like the way they swirl together. When it’s finished and glazed I create the chain, making it as tight a fit as I can to hold the cabochon snugly. Then I use a bit of clear epoxy on the back just to be sure that everything is secure. Finally I find a hand-dyed silk ribbon with colors that blend it all together. The cabochon is not quite 1 inch long. The silk tie is done with slip knots, so that it can be adjusted to the length you like. This necklace is very light and comfortable.
Unable to reconcile concepts such as social hierarchies, cruelty, or even sarcasm, Ian’s Americanization was swift and brutal. He emerged from adolescence with a distrust of groups, a passion for the obscure, and an enduring inability to differentiate the novel from the obvious. It is these traits that pushed him out of the Midwest and towards America’s eastern coastline.
After attending the Rhode Island School of Design and later MassArt in Boston, he waved on the precipice between calculated eccentricity and heroic perversion. His work represents an attempt to treat nebulous, passing, vision as Platonic Ideal. He brings it into manifestation through fierce application of technical virtuosity.
Currently, Ian maintains a studio in Waltham and occasionally teaches classes in silver casting and metalsmithing at various craft schools throughout Massachusetts.
Inside all of us there are flickering moments folding into themselves. My task is to see them, hold them in mind, and take them seriously long enough that they can become tangible.
The images on this site are part of a body of work that uses shapes inspired by animal forms to explore the relationship between jewelry as signifiers of wealth, social status, or sexual attractiveness; and the animal plumes, crests, horns, and tails which serve similar functions in their respective kingdoms.
In these works, I have attempted to generate a tension between attraction and repulsion, the seductive and the dangerous. The objects are graceful, elegant, and constructed from exalted materials like gold and silver. They terminate into spines, blades, and interlocking plates of armor. In this way they ask to be touched, but warn us to do so cautiously.
Barbara’s background in the arts began as a dancer with a small modern dance company in NYC. As a student of the Martha Graham technique, she learned how the body moves through space. One movement transitioning to the next with effortless grace. Her designs and energy reflects the same passion she approached dance. Simplicity of movement and design.
Master goldsmith Charles Lewton-Brain said of Barbara’s spring fever work, “You’ve taken an idea and made it your own. It’s so delicate!”
Cape Ann Designs
Jacqueline Ganim-Defalco ventured into the world of wearable art in 2003. She displayed her work for the first time at the October 2004 Sea Glass Festival in Rockport, Mass.
Inspired by her husband Michael and their mutual passion for history and antique glass collecting, she decided to combine her business and creative skills. Recognizing an unfilled niche for high quality, custom designed hair accessories, she pulled together pieces of sea glass from Cape Ann.
Now she creates a collection of hair accessories and jewelry. She expanded to nearly twenty boutiques. Boston Globe, Cape Ann Magazine, and North Shore Magazine among others featured her work.
In 2008, Jacqueline’s work appeared prominently in A Passion for Sea Glass, the latest book by author Carole Lambert. Jacqueline helped form the Wearable Arts group inside of seARTS. The group hosts an annual holiday show in Gloucester.
As a child I watched my mother work in fashion design and as a sculptor. We shared a love of color, texture and innovative, sleek design. In my work I use a wide variety of beautiful beads from all over the world. My jewelry, purses and scarf designs start with an idea. My trove of beads and gems, and any material that inspires. Swarovski crystals, seed beads, sea glass, polymer clay, inner tubes, zippers, straws, resin … anything that generates a creative design.
I find beauty in everything and can make art out of anything. At the end of the day I fall asleep picturing new ideas and often wake in the middle of the night. I specialize in custom work, melding the ideas and feelings of the client with my own to create a piece. I seek to artistically captures the wearer’s unique personality or the meaning of a special occasion.
As an experienced artist, my attraction to making jewelry is the joy of creativity, diversity of stones, colors, shapes and textures of materials. I lovingly make my designs with only the highest quality semi precious gemstones, freshwater pearls, Swarovski Crystals and natural geodes. My signature piece is a three-strand crocheted necklace of freshwater pearls or semi precious gemstones.
Another specialty is a pendant necklace of semi precious gemstones, freshwater pearls, Swarovski Crystals and one of a kind striking agate geodes from South America.
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Birthstones are precious materials that symbolize the month a person was born. Some believe birthstones hold power and personality traits unique to the person born under a specific zodiac sign. Wearing your birthstone brings good luck, some say.
