Black Dot Diary

One of the best things about hav­ing a blog is that I get to rave about the peo­ple I think are remark­able. One of these peo­ple is jew­elry artist Anne M. Kelly who will debut two excit­ing new lines at the upcom­ing Out of Hand Craft Fair on Novem­ber 20 — 22 at The Crys­tal Gar­den in Vic­to­ria BC.

Anne, who truly is one of the West Coast’s best kept secrets, cre­ates high-​demand orig­i­nal pieces of jew­elry, each with its own unique story. Because Anne is a pub­lished poet, the sto­ries that come with the jew­elry are works of art in them­selves. Her two newest col­lec­tions include a Native Species line fea­tur­ing Shibuichi Rough­skin Newts, and a Tim­o­r­phic line cre­ated from pure repur­posed aero­space titanium.

The Rough­skin Newt Pen­dant is cre­ated using an ancient Japan­ese alloy made of pure sil­ver and cop­per called Shibuichi. This metal was tra­di­tion­ally used in dec­o­ra­tive and func­tional Samu­rai sword guards, called tsuba, which pre­vented the sword-​wielding hand from slip­ping onto the blade.

Tita­nium cuff with sil­ver clasp by Anne. M. Kelly

The Tim­o­r­phic line, cre­ated from the mate­r­ial of space shut­tles and deep-​sea explo­ration uses his­tor­i­cal chain mail weaves to cre­ate jew­elry that is almost fabric-​like. With silky tex­ture and feather-​light weight. The result is some of the most lux­u­ri­ously wear­able, glam­ourous jew­elry you’ve ever expe­ri­enced. With its ancient pat­terns and a futur­is­tic edge, Anne refers to it as jew­elry a time trav­eler might wear.

Anne is not just con­tent with cre­at­ing beau­ti­ful things — she likes her work to make a dif­fer­ence. That’s why part of all sales of her Native Species jew­elry sales will be donated to con­ser­va­tion of native species and habi­tat and will also gen­er­ate microloans to the world’s most impov­er­ished women through http://​www​.kiva​.org.

I own sev­eral pieces of jew­elry by Anne. When­ever I wear them, I am usu­ally sur­rounded by women and men who want to know about the artist. I met Anne almost 20 years ago when we were both in a poetry salon with poet Robin Skel­ton. I became fast friends with this beau­ti­ful and tal­ented woman who, with her New Orleans back­ground, always brings an intrigu­ing sense of the exotic to any gathering.

Japan­ese Lace Col­lar with Nine Row Ear­rings and Semi­spher­ica by Anne M. Kelly

In the 1990s a car acci­dent changed Anne’s life. Fol­low­ing sev­eral years of reha­bil­i­ta­tion and adap­ta­tion, she com­bined her dis­tinc­tive style of graphic design with a love of fash­ion and nat­ural his­tory to cre­ate her first col­lec­tion of jew­elry. Watch­ing her work is like watch­ing alchemy — each piece she cre­ates is imbued with such story and magic that is would be dif­fi­cult not to feel mag­i­cal each time you wear a piece of her jew­elry. If the god­dess incar­nated, no doubt she would want to wear Anne M. Kelly jewelry.

Anne is a con­trib­u­tor to Chain Mail Jew­elry: Con­tem­po­rary Designs from Clas­sic Tech­niques, pub­lished by Lark Books. Her jew­elry is sold in The Avenue on Oak Bay Avenue in Vic­to­ria, at Mattick’s Farm Gallery in Saanich, and by pri­vate commission.

You can also see her work this week­end (Novem­ber 20–22) at the Out of Hand Craft Fair, Booth #17, The Crys­tal Gar­dens in Vic­to­ria, BC, or on her web­site http://​www​.annemkel​l​ly​de​signs​.com.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, November 17th, 2009 at 5:56 pm and is filed under Art, Body, Design, Mind, Poetry. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.