Art ~ There is room for all of us to create…
Sculpture in MOMA’s Garden
Ariane Zurcher Jewelry ~ 18 Kt Brushed Gold and Baroque Pearl Earrings With Removable 18 Kt Brushed Gold Attachments
Ariane Zurcher Jewelry ~ 18 Kt Brushed Gold & Baroque Pearls With Removable 18 Kt Brushed Gold Attachments
Wooden Sculpture at Metropolitan Museum of Art
18 Kt Brushed Gold & 42 ct Green Aquamarine Ring
Inspiration… One of the most common questions I’m asked is – “Where do you get your inspiration?”
I hear it so often, I made a separate page on this blog entitled, Life, which is a collage of images of the people, places and things that inspire me.
I grew up in a house filled with abstract art, both modern and primitive. My father was a curator of pre-Columbian and African Art at the Stanford Museum. He and my mother collected art spanning many cultures and time periods. Our house was often frequented by artists and art dealers from all over the world.
One of my favorite pieces was this wooden sculpture, now on the ranch where my mother lives, in Colorado. It is by a friend of my parents, Francois Stahly. Both Francois and my father had Swiss roots and had lived in Paris. In the 70’s Francois Stahly came to visit us and I remember he and my father sitting outside together, speaking French, at our ranch style home in Northern California, as the fog receded back toward the Pacific Ocean over the foothills.
Nature, art, paintings, sculpture… different languages, different cultures, diversity… this is what inspires me.
This is what makes me happy… Today I live in New York City. A city known for its diversity. The same things that enthralled me as a child, continue to excite and fascinate me now.
Ariane Zurcher Jewelry – The Lotus Collection – 18 Kt Brushed Gold, Amethyst & Ruby Earrings
One of my favorite New York City haunts is the Highline. I even made a Pinterest Board devoted entirely to it. I love seeing the old rusting tracks of the elevated freight train disappear into native grasses and spring flowers. The juxtaposition of natural beauty with man-made invention, abandoned, aging and transformed by time and life.
Samadhi/Transitions Collection ~18 Kt Brushed Gold Bracelet with Removable Diamond Adornment
Balance. People talk about it all the time. Balancing a career with family. Balancing time, balancing finances, balancing meetings, conference calls, parent/teacher conferences, holidays, ambition… balance… What does that even mean? Who does it well? Does anyone do it well? Or do each of us do the best we can a minute at a time?
Lotus Collection ~ 18 Kt Gold & Sapphire Bracelet
The first collection I put together was the Juno Collection. I created it using hot wax I shot out of a gun on to a form. It was 2007 about three years after my daughter was diagnosed with Autism. About a year after I created the collection I was interviewed and asked, “So do you think this collection represents chaos and what was going on for you at the time?” My immediate response was, “No!” When I thought more about that question, I thought about how that collection represents the beauty of the unknown; I imagine it as a galaxy and the gemstones are stars. It’s about hundreds of threads, people, places, things and how everything intersects and how together we create something complex, intricate and how it’s all interwoven. That interviewers question had me thinking about what inspires us to create. I realized that on a more practical level I needed to create a collection that dealt with balance and to me the essence of balance is in the ability to be flexible. (I struggle with both!) How do we do all we need to do in any given day and not have things fall through the cracks. Is it even possible?
Samadhi/Transitions Collection ~ 18 Kt Gold & Baroque Pearl Earrings with Removable 18 Kt Gold Adornments
I don’t know the complete answer to that, but the partial answer is being flexible. The Transitions Collection was born with exactly this thinking in mind. How could I create a collection of jewelry that met the varied and often disparate needs of a woman who is like me: someone who has a career, children, husband, friends, travels and all that involves? Someone who might need to be at a business meeting and yet have the flexibility to take a sick child to the pediatrician at the drop of a hat. Someone who, in a given day, might need to leave work, go to a friend’s book party or an art opening, before going to the theatre with their husband? Or someone who travels for work, but needs to have a few things that are elegant for various evening functions. What kind of jewelry could I design that would meet those women’s needs and might reflect that kind of diversity in one’s day?
Juno/Transitions Collection~ 18 Kt Gold & Amethyst Earrings With Removable 18 Kt Gold & Sapphire Adornments
The Transitions Collection was born! It had to be comfortable, the jewelry had to move with you. So I designed it so it became a part of you and you forgot you were wearing it. To achieve this required intricate workmanship. Each piece is hand fabricated and slightly different from the other. You start with a base necklace, bracelet and/or earrings and add beautiful gemstones, a clasp, or extend the necklace so it can be worn over a turtle neck. The bracelet is a bracelet, but it is also an extension to the necklace. A diamond pavé clasp is added to the base necklace and the whole look changes. Flexibility, balance, beauty.
Keeping all of this in mind, I am having a “play date with Jewelry” event here in New York City May 8th & 9th from 11am – 5pm. If you’d like to join me in playing and seeing the Transitions Collection RSVP either by commenting here or through email ~ ariane@arianezurcher.com.
B23 – 18 Kt Brushed Gold & 18 VSII .31 ct. Diamond Bracelet ~ Total Diamond ct weight = 5.58 ct
When my daughter, Emma was diagnosed with autism I threw myself into research the way a starving man forages for scraps. I describe it this way, because the degree of desperation I felt was acute, and at the time, I viewed autism as “life-threatening”. It saddens me now, looking back, that the information we were given regarding autism and what that supposedly meant, for not only our daughter, but for all of us, has not changed dramatically. How many parents to newly diagnosed children will feel what I once felt? How many parents will go home and throw themselves into the monumental task of educating themselves about autism and will read similar stories as I once did? How many parents will believe that “recovery” from Autism is a concrete and noble goal for their child? How many parents will fall into line pursuing any number of dubious treatments all in the name of “saving” their child? Because I can tell you, that pursuit, that mind-set of desperately seeking “recovery” from Autism is a dangerous mirage.
R12 – 18 Kt Brushed Gold & 16.5 ct Pink Tourmaline Ring
About a year and a half into my “research” my husband, Richard came to me and expressed his concern, not for Emma, though he absolutely loves both our children and feels concern for their well-being, not for her diagnosis, not for anything we were or weren’t doing, no, he expressed concern for me. I remember the feeling of rage that welled up inside of me. I remember thinking that I hated him for voicing his thoughts. I remember my outrage and indignation. I remember. All because he dared to suggest, “You have to find something that has nothing to do with autism.” Did he not understand that I was saving our daughter’s life?! Could he not see that I was single-handedly engaged in a battle? While he stood there looking at me with love and worry, I fumed. I no longer remember the words exchanged, I can’t remember our exact conversation, but I remember the gist of it. I remember how pained he looked when I angrily attacked him, suggesting that were it not for me, our child would be thrown under the proverbial bus.
But my husband is not easily pushed aside. My husband is a tough negotiator, a dogged persuader, a pit bull in a junk yard, he can go up against the best of them and still come out standing. In other words, I didn’t have a chance in hell. Still I put up a good fight. Richard, not to be undone by my hurling insults, stood firm. You see he understood something I didn’t. He saw what I was doing and he could see what it was doing to me, even if I couldn’t. “You’re depressed,” he said. I glared at him. “You can’t even see it.” How do you argue with that? How can you counter unawareness? You can’t. But Richard loves me and kept trying to get through and even though I didn’t understand and didn’t agree with what he was saying I could hear the love in his voice. I could feel his words.
E206_ATT29 – 18 Kt Brushed Gold Earrings with Removable 18 Kt Brushed Gold & 30.15 ct Prehnite Drops
As a direct result of that difficult conversation I began taking classes in jewelry making. I’d gone to Parsons School of Design, majoring in Fashion Design, knew before I’d even graduated with my bachelors degree that fashion design was not for me, and worried that jewelry was too similar, but I was wrong. There is something about working with metal, carving a wax model, sketching a new design, figuring out how something will hang or how a clasp will function and yet add an artistry to the piece, that transports me. When I am working, time becomes meaningless, the world, worries and fears move into a corner. When I am designing and making jewelry it is as though I am in another dimension. A magical place where it is just me and my work, there are no words, my emotions become the work, they are embedded in the design. Art does not intersect life as much as it becomes life.
I found a studio. I began to create…
R17 – 18 Kt Brushed Gold Ring
E184 – 18 Kt Brushed Gold, 12.3 ct Rubelite, SI2 – .44 ct Diamond Earrings with Removable 18 Kt Brushed Gold, & 82.1 ct Indicolite Tourmaline Drops
After awhile I began selling my work. My ‘jewelry‘ (click ‘jewelry’ for Ariane Zurcher Jewelry website) began getting noticed, I won some awards, and suddenly two years after having that conversation with my husband, I had a business. In 2010 I began a blog ~ click ‘Emma’s Hope Book‘ ~ where I write about autism, my daughter and the hope she gives me for this world and all the people in it.
Welcome!
Please don’t forget to ‘like’ my ‘Ariane Zurcher Designs‘ Facebook page, by clicking on the link or at the bottom of this post and if you’d like to receive additional posts from this blog, be sure to sign up and follow! I will post once a week or so.
I’d love to hear from all of you ~ what inspires you?
Horse paper-piece block 8x8 PDF pattern
$6.00
Stitch Along: Dorset Button Glasses Case
$400.00 – $695.00
stitch Along: Dorset Button Scissor Case
$400.00 – $650.00
Improvisational Stitching
$500.00
DIY Large Zippered Wool & Cotton Bag PDF Pattern
$12.00
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