The last entry in my Handshake 1 blog concluding my journey with Lisa Walker expressed my gratitude for her encouragement: ‘All this thinking, conceptual jumping and experimenting has taken me places I would not have gone otherwise’.
I had finally reached a stage in my practice and in our mentorship where I felt I had achieved ‘total confidence in what I do’.
In many ways this statement has somewhat lost its way but I realise that this might be a good thing. Confidence takes continual practice, maintenance, experimentation, test runs, successes, failures, doing, thinking, making, wearing, giving.
The Handshake format encourages a state of hyper making, experimenting and critical thinking that I look forward to engaging with again. Participating in Handshake 1 moved and changed my normal making practice in a multitude of ways as the experimental work leapt over and cross-pollinated my silicone pieces.
Here is a selection of things I have been doing since Handshake 1. I have become obsessed with melting silver and experimenting with it when it is wet. I have also been developing the video work, dabbling with projecting the jewellers eye view onto people and places. I hope to leave Silicone behind now – but who knows, maybe it will seep in occasionally.
You can read all about my Handshake 1 mentorship with Lisa Walker here. And visit my website here. And see a video about my practice prepared by the Auckland Art Gallery during Wunderrūma here.