Today, we begin a bit differently.
Normally, we use this space to highlight Wings’s past silverwork: pieces that were made long ago, or that were special commissioned works that never made it to the Web site. we will do that today, too — and today’s throwback falls squarely into the latter category, a more recent commission that has not yet appeared here — but I want to approach it, to some degree, in reverse.
And so we begin instead with one of Wings’s photos, a study of one small but powerful aspect of our world right here on this land, captured at a very specific moment in time: late winter into early spring. It is true that this world is greener now, and warmer, too, but we are only a very few weeks removed from the silvered branches and lazuli skies of the image above.
May indigenous cultures around the world include, as part of their symbolism, a Tree of Life. Its form and meaning vary with geography and time, with identity and language, but for those traditions that encompass the concept, it seems to be a near-universal that part of its meaning includes ideas of birth and rebirth, of renewal and life everlasting, or something close to it. Perhaps it’s grounded in early peoples’ understanding of the importance of trees to our human survival; perhaps it’s an honoring of the cyclical, survivalist nature of flowering and dormancy; perhaps it’s an intuition that something that is reborn with the warm winds every year has power to give us and lessons to teach us.
Perhaps it’s all these things.
But here on this continent, Sundance cultures have their own version of the Tree of Life; Three Fires cultures have their understanding of it; Pueblo cultures have their own interpretation of it. Doubtless dozens, perhaps hundreds (historically? perhaps thousands) of Turtle Island’s indigenous nations recognize and honor their own versions of this powerful symbol. So do other cultures around the world.
And here, where trees play an integral role in our daily lives, it’s understandable how such a symbol could assume a significant role in certain traditional events. After all, the slopes of the sacred peaks are forested with evergreens — cedar and juniper, piñon and other pines, red fir and spruce. Both there and at our own lower elevations, the aspens carpet the earth’s surface, interspersed with stands of ancient cottonwood, various species of weeping and globe willow, and the shrub-like stands of red willow. In the winter, they are silver and bone; in spring and summer, flowering green; in autumn, a near-spectrum of blazing color. Fully-leafed or bare-branched, they are living beings, sentinel spirits standing tall and strong against a blue desert sky.
And here, they are life itself.
So it should also be no surprise than artist as attuned to the natural world of his people as Wings is has used the Tree of Life to great effect in his silverwork for many years. But some six or seven years ago, he created a piece that outdid them all. It’s a piece that we featured here in this space, on an earlier #ThrowbackThursday. And it was that post that led directly to today’s featured work.
The original Tree of Life necklace was a made with a beautiful slender teardrop of rich blue lapis lazuli, topped by a tiny round blue-violet lapis cab.
At the time, it represented one of the most striking lapis specimens we’d ever seen, and Wings kept it in reserve for something special. Eventually, the day came when he was inspired to turn it into the necklace you see immediately above: a simple bezel-set cabochon trimmed in twisted silver, with an ajouré Tree of Life cut freehand out of the bezel’s back. He gave it a lightly flared bail, added the diminutive violet cab to it, and strung the pendant on plain sterling silver snake chain. It sold in 2010 or 2011, if memory serves.
But when I wrote about it here in late 2015, it caught the eye of one of our dearest friends. She is something of a collector of Wings’s work, steadily amassing complete sets of his jewelry built around specific stones. And when she noticed that day’s post, she was captivated by stone and imagery alike. She already some of his earrings, a pin, and a barrette in lapis, and she decided it was time to commission a necklace to match.
She wanted something as simple as the original, with the focus on the stone and symbol. But a design such as this requires a stone of outstanding quality and character, and it’s not necessarily a simple or easy process to find one. She was less concerned about the shape of the stone, although she liked the proportions of the teardrop form, and she gave me license to spend a significant amount of time searching for the perfect stone for her.
It took months.
In the meantime, Wings had the concept rolling around in his head. What would come out of it were slight variations in the overall design hat made it uniquely hers, and also made it especially fitting for the stone we ultimately found.
As you can see, the bezel shape is vaguely reminiscent of a teardrop, although wider and more free-form in its lines. Why will become clear in a moment. But the earlier necklace featured a long but exceptionally slender teardrop cabochon, and it was a challenge to fit a Tree of Life design into the narrow confines of the bezel’s back. Wings solved that problem by making the tree itself a wavy, flowing spirit, one that perhaps better resembled a tall shrub than a ordinary tree. With the new design from last fall, he had the benefit of a long flat back, one broader than the earlier version, and it gave him the leeway he needed to create a tree that more closely resembled the great silver-branched spirits of this place, tall and strong and sturdy, with arms outstretched to embrace the sky. As is his custom, he cut the Tree of Life out of the silver setting freehand, using a tiny jeweler’s saw. In this instance, he made the bail a part of the setting itself, soldered a bold free-form scalloped bezel to the front, and trimmed the entire setting, once again, with twisted silver.
Then it was time to set the stones.
The small round bail cabochon was simple. The focal stone was something else entirely.
I had spent months searching, both from our usual supplier and from a wide array of online sources all over the world. No one had anything suitable; if the size was right, shape or color were off; if the cab’s color and quality were suitable, it was too small. I let her know what the current crop of available lapis looked like, and then gave it a rest for a time.
And then one day, I did another search. And I found myself staring into the most stunning specimen of lapis lazuli I’d ever seen. It was pure cobalt, aswirl in creamy gradient shades, with a domed and beveled surface and shot through with glittery metallic strands as thin as silk.
And it was in Australia.
But we have ordered from overseas lapidary artists many times over the years, and this cabochon, despite its naturally high price tag, was like nothing we’d ever encountered. The stone itself was from Afghanistan, as is usual, but the lapidarist is Australian, and his work is so brilliant that we have since purchased several more stones from him.
And so we ordered it. It arrived in under two weeks, a record for most such orders. [We have since learned that that is the norm with this cutter.] And the necklace you see immediately above is the result.
It was perfect for our friend: the same sort of intense jewel tones that she so loves, a shape much like a feminine spirit being . . . and simultaneously, like an expanse of pure blue sky. The Tree of Life on the reverse is her own personal sentry, a spirit being to stand guard over her, silvered arms reaching out to embrace the heavens and bring them to her.
And it brings her a bit of the magic of other lands — lands where, perhaps like her own, and like ours, they honor its symbolism of rebirth and renewal, a little magic for every season.
~ Aji
All content, including photos and text, are copyright Wings and Aji, 2017; all rights reserved. Nothing herein may used or reproduced in any form without the express written permission of the owners.
