Between Drip and Smoulder

Between Drip and Smoulder is a series of brass jewellery pieces exploring the relationship between process, material, and embodied knowledge. Each work began not with a drawing, but with molten wax dripped onto dried Australian seeds held between the fingers. As layers accumulated, form emerged through the behaviour of material rather than the direction of design. The final shape of each piece was determined by chance. The angle of the drip, the weight of the wax, the resistance of the seed.
The lost-wax casting process that followed introduced a further transformation. The wax original is destroyed in casting, consumed and replaced by brass. What remains is a permanent record of a momentary gesture, form preserved at the point of material change.
Australian seeds are embedded within each cast, carrying the ecological memory of fire-adapted landscapes. Survival is not a matter of avoiding disruption but of developing the capacity to respond to it. This process of learning through repeated, uncertain encounters is reflected in the making itself. Early attempts involved significant risk of harm; however, as familiarity with material behavior increased, that risk was gradually reduced. Over time, skill was developed through experience.
Residue also does not document a process so much as hold the interval between action and consequence. The material seems to decide its form before I am fully aware, leaving me rushing to keep pace. Thus, this artwork positions jewellery as a site where chance, craft, and ecological thinking intersect, tracing how form, knowledge, and resilience are each built incrementally from what cannot be fully controlled.