ORIGINS | sticks-and-stones

THE GENESIS OF STICKS AND STONES

My name is Cayenne Linke, and I have been making jewelry almost as long as I've been breathing. In high school, I would hang any 'ol thing from my ears -- from Barbie heads to shellacked Saltine crackers...definitely not my finest hour, accessories-wise.

I also surreptitiously deconstructed my mother's old costume jewelry, and gave it new life in the form of all manner of postmodern statement jewelry. Yes, it's true -- I was dabbling in postmodernism before postmodernism was cool.

Alas, maturity and other artistic pursuits found their way into my life, and making jewelry fell by the wayside...until one August night in 2011....

...I had been working with Dr. John Pojman -- chemistry professor and Dean of Graduate Studies at Louisiana State University. Dr. Pojman had invented a polymer product that was originally intended for use as a cure-on-demand wood filler.

A fellow artist met Dr. Pojman at a chemistry symposium in Portland, and remarked upon the potential aesthetic applications of this magical product. Dr. Pojman was also excited by this notion, and my artist friend and I became Dr. Pojman's two beta testers for aesthetic uses of the product (due to its wild success as an artistic medium, it's now marketed as an art product called 3P Art Medium).

I had experimented with the product on canvas, as well as in small sculptural pieces, and was eager to find still more applications for it. This was when I decided to try making some jewelry with it. Having long-since used most of my beads, I thought "what do I have on hand that I could incorporate into jewelry?" "Sticks," was my self-reply..."I have tons of beautiful willow and birch sticks...and stones and pebbles from the garden."

And thus I descended back into my beloved jewelry-making. This time, however, I'd advanced beyond simply stringing beads (and/or Barbie parts and salty baked wafers), and wanted to employ my painting and sculptural skills in the creation of each piece. The idea of using prefabricated elements was an assault on my artistic sensibilities, which is why most of the materials used in my jewelry are fashioned by either nature or myself.

To date, I've only made four sets of jewelry using the 3P (two of which are to the left of this section), but I plan on making many, many more. I ended up falling so in love with the challenge of incorporating natural elements into jewelry, that my initial impetus of experimenting with the 3P took a back seat to the more pressing endeavor of working with sticks and stones.

One of the beauties of making my own elements from clay is that I'm also able to embed other substances into the clay. This led me to the making "memorial jewelry." I can (and do!) embed human or pet cremains (ashes) into the clay, then incorporate the finished elements into jewelry and other items. For more information on this service, please click the "Memorial Jewelry" link in the header on the bottom right of the home page.

Not only will my sticks and stones not break your bones, but the words you'll hear as a result of wearing these neck sculptures will be decidedly uplifting.

Cheers!

Cayenne