The day has dawned warm and quiet beneath an utterly cloudless sky. Whatever else this day brings, for the moment, it’s enough to revel in the fullness of spring.
There will undoubtedly be winds later in the day; such is the nature of the season here. Colder air, too — after all, wind at this time of year is rarely a gentle breeze, instead delivering all the force and fury of the gale with none of the rain to make it seem worthwhile.
Still, whatever else comes of this day, we have these moments: two hours yet to midday, and the mercury already nearing sixty, green underfoot and blue overhead, butterflies whirling through the clear air and the cloudless silver light of illuminating skies.
Today’s featured work, a masterwork, in truth, embodies the skies and the light and the butterflies together. From its description in the Belts Gallery here on the site:
Butterflies are small but powerful spirits, visionary and prophetic, who wing their way to our world across illuminating skies. Wings summons the spirit of Butterfly and of the skies it inhabits, across this silver and turquoise cascade of this traditional concha belt. Wrought in an old and archetypal style, it features twelve separate classic conchas separated by thirteen old-style “butterfly” conchas, with a pair of the latter flanking the buckle at either end. Each classic concha is cut and scalloped around the edges, entirely freehand; lightly domed, repoussé-fashion; and meticulously hand-stamped in a highly detailed traditional design of concentric ovals that repeats across each piece. The stampwork begins with hand-scored lines radiating outward into small sunrise symbols, all chased in a clockwise fashion around the inner oval. The next oval is formed of a flowering pattern separated by tiny hoops — three upward-reaching petals of light flanking small perfect orbs on either side, forming the last line of stampwork on the gently sloping domed portion of the concha. Where the doming ends to flare into the scalloped edge, Wings has detailed it with labor-intensive chasing, tiny accent marks creating perfect definition along the flowing line of the oval. Outward from the chased line, a larger sunrise symbol rises toward the edge of each petal-like scallop. At the center of each oval concha rests a small round cabochon of spiderweb turquoise, set in a plain low-profile bezel, each stone a shade of robin’s-egg blue matrixed with tiny coppery and inky blue-black lines, some with translucent wisps of spring green floating over the surface. The butterfly conchas are hand-stamped in a traditional flaring design, wings at top and bottom, their entire pleated surfaces domed, repoussé-fashion, to give them a three-dimensional appearance. The buckle is hand-scored inward from the edge to create a narrow border; inside the border, the center is hand-hammered with scores, perhaps hundreds, of tiny separate strikes of the jeweler’s hammer, then hand-scored outward from the center in a radiant motif. Along the outer border, tiny lodge symbols against a radiant sun repeat along all four sides, with slightly larger lodge symbols sitting solitary at each corner. At the buckle’s center rests an oval cabochon of beautiful robin’s-egg blue turquoise, probably from the Montezuma District, with a beautifully abstract matrix in bold coppery-red spiderwebbing. The belt itself is heavy brown-black leather, hand-cut, hand-split, hand-beveled along the edges, and hand-stamped down its entire length in a radiant sun motif. The belt is finished off with brown-black braided leather figure-eight ties that terminate in sterling silver tips with tiny globe-like ends. The belt is 52″ long and the leather strip is 11/16″ wide; the oval conchas are 2-1/16″ long by 1-7/8 inches high; the round center cabochons are 7/16″ across; the butterfly conchas are 1.5″ long by 1-1/8″ across at the widest point; the buckle is 2-5/16″ long by 1-3/4″ high; the oval center cabochon is 1″ long by 5/8″ high; the silver tips on the ties are 1-7/8″ long; the ties themselves are 7″ long (all dimensions approximate). Close-up views shown below.
Sterling silver; spiderwebbed blue turquoise (most likely from the Royston and Montezuma Districts)
$7,500 + shipping, handling, and insurance
Notes: Requires special handling; extra shipping charges apply.
The leather belt is a standard length; a hand-made belt in a specialty size may be ordered
(either shorter or longer) for an additional $325 charge.
This is, without question, the most flawless belt Wings has ever created. I’ve never seen such deeply uniform stampwork across so very many conchas, a full dozen of them, each virtually identical to the next. The stones are beautifully centered, each chosen for depth of color and complexity of matrix. The butterfly conchas are made with extraordinary depth and rich, velvety surface texture. And the buckle is its own work of art in miniature, a hand-hammered surface like the shimmering ripples of a lake beneath the light, the elemental stone at their center as radiant as any desert sun.
I have said that butterflies are messengers, harbingers of hope, and indeed they are . . . but here, they are also the guardians and guides of illumination, bringers of the light that reveals wisdom.
It’s a light we need now.
And the early appearance of our summer spirits this year tells me that they are here to help us find it.
~ Aji
All content, including photos and text, are copyright Wings and Aji, 2020; all rights reserved. Nothing herein may used or reproduced in any form without the express written permission of the owner.
