10th Day of Christmas Feature on Duane

I made the Duane back so long ago that I don't even remember the date. It was a simple piece that just came out like a little sculptural form using build up wax, which was my modus operandi when I started working with wax. I used a little alcohol lamp for heating the wax and dental tools.


For example, the new Griffin box with tiny leaves on the lid was made using this same process. I actually worked on that lid years ago and it sat around my studio until this last collection. A lot of work went into that crazy piece. I am not sure I could find that kind of focus these days, the detail was so great. Now I tend to do more carving of hard wax combined with fabrication out of metal sheet.



An example of this technique would be the Mizu and Titania necklace. You can see the huge difference in both styles compared with the Wabi Sabi simplicity of the Duane.

The soul is here for its own joy comes from a much longer poem by Rumi translated by the poet Coleman Barks.

We are so proud to have a relationship with Mr. Barks, who translates the words of the great poet Rumi. His translation is considered to be the finest for its own poetic merit and beauty. It is because of Mr. Barks that the curtain was lifted on the words of this great ancient poet.

SOMEONE DIGGING IN THE GROUND

An eye is meant to see things.
The soul is here for its own joy.
A head has one use: for loving a true love.
Legs: to run after.

Love is for vanishing into the sky. The mind,
for learning what men have done and tried to do.
Mysteries are not to be solved. The eye goes blind
when it only wants to see why.

A lover is always accused of something.
But when he finds his love, whatever was lost
in the looking comes back completely changed.

On the way to Mecca, many dangers: thieves,
the blowing sand, only camel's milk to drink.
Sill each pilgrim kisses the black stone there
with pure longing, feeling in the surface
the taste of the lips he wants.

This talk is like stamping new coins. They pile up,
while the real work is done outside
by someone digging the ground.

--Rumi