Walking Stick (for someone who stays indoors, mostly)

Created for Exhibition in Motion, Society of North American Goldsmiths Conference, San Francisco, CA, 2003, and later selected for the Northwest Biennial curated by Gladys Nilsson, Tacoma Art Museum, 2004.

The setting I envision Walking Stick for Someone Who Stays Indoors, Mostly is in the corner of an urban-dweller’s apartment. The owner spent enough of their childhood exploring the mountains that they still have a memory of what grows there, but now lives a busy life in the city. He is so out of touch with nature that he might even believe that this stick grew this way, cut straight from the tree with these strange flowers intact. Someday, he plans to hike in the forest again, but for now, this stick is his only connection with nature.

I created this stick for the “Exhibition in Motion” for the Society of North American Goldsmiths’ annual conference. This invitational event showcases several dozen members’ work in a fashion-show-type atmosphere. It’s one of my favorite parts of the conference–many of the pieces are quite elaborate and stunning, others simple and hilarious. Since I am one of the few members whose work is not wearable, (let alone metal!), I decided to do a walking stick. Velvet da Vinci organized this particular conference, and coordinated with the Art Institute’s fashion design department to have them make original outfits to accompany early drawings of the pieces the artists intended to create. These photographs are of the spectacular outfit made for my walking stick.