Telling a story in Silver .... everything has a beginning.

It never ceases to amaze me how things that happen by default, end up being a portal to a whole new existence.

When I started at The Learning Connexion, it was my intention to stay extramural, painting and plodding away in my little studio at home. After having done the introductory weeks at the Taita campus (Foundation), I discovered quite by accident that there was a jewellery class that I could attend as it ran on a Monday and Tuesday.

At that stage, the main campus was in Island Bay, and I often found myself overwhelmed by the sheer volume of energy bouncing around in that place, so to be able to stay out at Taita with relatively few people, suited me perfectly. I would happily forgo the opportunity to do all the other exciting activities on offer out there, and take a class I knew nothing about or had little interest in (initially!) just for the quieter experience.

This also coincided with the beginning of our surrogacy journey, so my emotional state was somewhat fragile, and I needed the more nurturing and personal one on one experience avaialable at Taita.

I found the discipline required by this craft to be challenging. My usual style of working was just to start somewhere and turn it into something, and just to see where it went. With jewellery, designing, planning and forethought are the base requirements. The precision was also a great challenge to someone who is used to often wearing more paint than makes it onto the canvas. Dealing with measurements in millimetres and less was a new experience to say the least.

The other component that saw my progression with this craft was an incredibly patient and understanding tutor. Hanne Eriksen-Mapp has been a solid presence on my path to precision and expression in this craft, and even after all this time, she still patiently guides me, always meeting me where ever I am at emotionally, mentally and in my personal journey to parenthood via surrogacy.

Jewellery - at least the jewellery that I have the skill set to make, gives me the sense of being an alchemist.

I can take something so solid and inflexible, change its form from solid to liquid and back again, and touch people's hearts and souls with the results of my thoughts and feelings, a great deal of heat, and some basic techniques that others have taken the time to share with me.

So quite by default, simply because this was the only class available on the days I was free in the space I could cope with... I have discovered a passion that I didn't even know I had. I love the challenge of finding my own voice in this genre. From this place, a range of jewellery is emerging that is an expression of the unique experiences faced by those who live in the infertility realm. It also allows me to express other aspects of myself by introducing crystals, gemstones and symoblism.

I have discovered the ebb and flow of carving wax and casting it into it's permanent form in silver. There is an inherent grief that can accompany this process, as I have to destroy the piece I have maticulously carved over many hours and become so connected to, and intimate with. And with all casting, there is always a risk that a work can be lost, and once it is lost, it can not be retrieved. All that work, all that energy is simply gone. It takes a degree of hope and trust to release the work to the heat and space that will then give birth to the permanent representation of that toil, that emotion.

And then a new relationship must be established with the work. It is no longer the beautiful transluscent, malleable material that I have come to know.

It is now a solid and unyeilding form that requires me to adapt my approach to bring forth its true potential and transform it from an impersonal, shaped chunk of metal into a work of art with a voice in its own right, that will carry my thoughts forward into the world.

Like raising a child, initially there is that gentle stage of molding where you become familiar with each other and go through a period of discovery. That precious stage where you take the time and energy to gently but firmly form them into the framework of the people they will become. Then as they go through the tempering of adolescence, through their own often painful transformation into individuals based on that inital forming, the solidness that emerges requires persistent but equally loving polishing. The basic form is there, all that is required is the vision and consistency to see it through so that the final product is ready for the world.