Here is my finished Narrative Pendant. It was inspired by an incident that took place when I was about 5 years old and got lost for an entire day at the beach in Nags Head, NC. I was with my cousin who was the same age and we wandered off counting jellyfish and before we knew it we were completely lost. We roamed the shoreline for hours until the sun went down and everyone cleared the beach. At some point during the night we decided to approach a stranger who was on his back porch and we explained what happened. Soon after the police arrived having been contacted earlier by our horrified parents. We were then driven back to the beach house and reunited with our frantic family.The materials used are copper, brass, freshwater pearls and brass wire rivets. The techniques used include chasing and repusse, sawing and piercing, riveting, jump ring making and soldering, pearl epoxy setting and liver of sulphur patina.
The concept of the piece is that one side is the front of a nautilus shell, an obvious representation of the beach and the other side is a cut-out maze design, which is symbolic of being lost. One side is dark (copper with patina) and the other side is light (shined brass) which symbolize day and night and also a dark time and a happy ending. In certain light, at certain angles, the brass "maze" catches the light and causes the pearls to become slightly "lost" inside the shell. At other angles the bright pearls become more prominent against the dark patina inside of the shell, as if found again.
