Much of the world this weekend has been focused on the trappings of empire: the pomp and pageantry of a colonial culture. In this instance, a royal wedding held some interest for those of us otherwise disposed to scorn such events, simply because the bride’s very identity was transgressive of colonial barriers. So, too, were many of her choices related to the ceremony itself, her own small way, perhaps, of forcing those in attendance (and remote observance) to reckon, however briefly, with their own colonizing, imperial, supremacist identities.
It is absolutely true that wearing a veil embroidered with flowers indigenous to each colonized (or formerly colonized) nation is not liberatory; by itself, it will emancipate exactly no one from the shackles of invasion and occupation, of appropriation and misrule. But it forced the chattering classes to note, however antiseptically, the fact of England’s imperial and colonial ambitions and history.
That’s something that would otherwise have been elided — indeed, erased entirely — had the one small, seemingly indulgent step not been taken.
None of this excuses the history or the reality. What it does is show opportunity: a chance to bring the ugliness into the light, which is a necessary first step toward healing.
Today’s featured work is built around an element from one of those so-called colonies, and around healing: a bit of that land’s earth that is as indigenous as its own people, in the motifs and colors of medicine. From its description in the relevant section of the Bracelets Gallery here on the site:
Leaf Medicine Cuff Bracelet
Leaf medicine is one of the most powerful healers, one our peoples have used in hundreds of forms over thousands of years. With this pattern-rolled cuff, hand-milled in a repeating geometric design of feathery fronds and leaves, Wings honors the medicines that have ensured our survival since the dawn of time, gifts of the earth used in ceremony and spirit. The leaves rise, three-dimensional, from the band’s surface, creating a flowing, elegant texture; the band is lightly oxidized and buffed to a soft, bright polish. The focal point is a free-form stone (not a cabochon) of lightly polished, slightly translucent pounamu, known in English as New Zealand greenstone, a form of fine nephrite jade sacred to that land’s indigenous Māori peoples. This specimen (part of a lot Wings acquired ethically through legal channels) curves in a gentle, asymmetrical arc that follows the lines of the leaves on the cuff. It sits in a scalloped bezel trimmed with twisted silver, the bezel raised slightly above the cuff on a columnar sterling silver pedestal. The band is 7″ long by 1″ across; the stone is 1.25″ long by 5/8″ across at the highest point (dimensions approximate).
Sterling silver; pounamu (New Zealand greenstone)
$1,025 + shipping, handling, and insurance
This is one of those works that is so simple, so spare and elegant, that it almost needs no description. It’s also one that became, for me, an instant favorite — as much because of what it represents as for the spectacular beauty of its design and execution. It’s a work that links our indigenous peoples all around the earth’s own hoop, the very embodiment of what we share as peoples born of and for our lands, who belong to them as much as they belong to us.
For this is what indigenous cultures know: Our lands give us what we need, soil and water and leaf and sky, food and shelter and medicine and spirit.
As we begin to rise against colonial constraints, as we look to heal our occupied histories, our lands hold a lesson for liberation, for our emancipated survival and free existence: To heal the land is to heal ourselves.
~ Aji
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