Yesterday, we looked at the role of music in Native art.
Today, we feature one of Wings’s masterworks, a piece that is itself a song for the light.
It’s fitting for this time of year, although “this time of year” is about a month earlier than usual. Our “usual” has altered significantly, given the still-early ravages of climate change. In a year in which summer consisted mostly of early and mid-July, fall has been here for more than a month already.
I admit to being unready for autumn. The cold air of both June and August has made me feel as though winter only just left, and is now already on the horizon once again. but fall is my own time of year, encompassing the month of my birth and the climate in which I am happiest, and in this place, this season holds one saving grace above all others.
The light.
As I have said many times before, the light here is a living thing, animated by its own spirit, and at no time is that more true than in autumn. It breathes, it has its own heartbeat, a drum to which it dances and shimmers and, yes, sings.
Today’s featured work honors that very spirit. From its description in the Necklaces Gallery here on the site:
The Light Spirit Necklace
Here, the light is a living thing, a spirit being all its own: one that dances through our days as a child of Father Sun, aided by the powers of the elements and the four directions. Wings gives life to this spirit being in an extraordinary figurative piece wrought in sterling silver and ethereal labradorite. The upper oval cabochon, which forms her head, is of the blue-green form of the stone, evoking air and water; her body is a teardrop lit with golden brown, the colors of earth and fire. She wears a tablita headdress in the traditional stair-stepped shape. At its center rests a stylized Morning Star formed of arrows pointed to the Four Sacred Directions; the star is flanked by a pair of flowering sun symbols, themselves reaching to the cardinal points. The reverse is excised in an ajouré geometric shape that hints at both the sacred directions and the guiding Eye of Spirit, also flanked by stylized freehand motifs of the cardinal points. The teardrop-shaped lower pendant similarly features an ajouré oval on its reverse, so that the stones may rest against the wearer’s skin. Both pendants are set into scalloped bezels trimmed with twisted silver, against a subtle outline of stampwork in sunrise symbols to emphasize the power and effect of the light. The two-piece pendant connects via an adjoining hinge, allowing the work to move and dance in the light; changes in background changes the hues of the stones slightly, allowing the figure to move along the spectrum. The entire piece hangs from a hand-made bail hand-stamped in matched thunderhead patterns that point to cardinal and ordinal points simultaneously, and is suspended from a necklace composed of graduated combinations of sterling silver rondel and round beads, tapering to lengths of round Florentine-finish silver beads, and ending in short segments of glossy gray hematite rondels. The whole pendant, including bail, hangs 5.75″ in length and measures 2-5/8″ across at the widest point; the upper cabochon is 1.75″ across by 1-5/8″ high; the lower cabochon is 1-7/8″ long by 1″ across at the widest point (dimensions approximate). Reverse shown above. Second in Wings’s new series, The Light Collection; coordinates with the Light In the Storm cuff bracelet found in our Bracelets Gallery. Joint design by Wings and Aji, in honor of Griffin, who was our spirit and our light.
Sterling silver; labradorite; sterling silver beads; hematite beads
$2,800 + shipping, handling, and insurance
Due to size, weight, and value, extra shipping charges apply
At this time of year, everything has a different quality: the light, the air, even scent and sound. The haunting notes of the Native flute are sharper, clearer, and yet more ethereal. The calls of the birds carry farther, and seem to hold the heart of the world in their songs.
And the light spirit itself sings its own song to us across the miles between earth and sky, high shine and low dusky shadow, a song for the world before winter comes.
~ Aji
All content, including photos and text, are copyright Wings and Aji, 2016; all rights reserved. Nothing herein may used or reproduced in any form without the express written permission of the owners.
