Hi Joyce,

Having worked with Emmy Kuster for some 30 years, a LOT of animal pieces have passed through my hands. Here are some photos, that are still uploaded at my Amber Group:

1) A necklace I made for Emmy, with a craved pendant presenting a lobster (or crustacian) in butter-yellow amber.

2) A pendant carved as the head of a horse. This was carved in Poland by a friend of Emmy's. I recommended to her that she have it mounted in silver (rather than drilled), and that the mount imitate the reins of a horse. The silversmith did a great job!

3) This is a group of pendants carved as frogs, with turquoise eyes. Emmy loves American Indian art, and hired Navajo silversmiths and carvers to work for her. She facilitated some of the earliest use of real amber by these artisans.

Jamey

4) A group of human heads. (People are animals too.)

5) A pair of sea-horses.

6) 18 elephants

JDA.

7) Here's a group of various animals and subjects.

8) This is a necklace I made for Emmy, using a carved pale amber bear effigy, and a turquoise frog (from China, I believe), with Baltic amber beads and Chinese turquoise beads. It's quite beautiful.

JDA.

Hi Jamey: my congratulations for the idea of assimilating the horse silver mount to the reins!

Lobster necklace and the horse with silver reins are favorites of the group. Jamey's talk on amber to the Northern CA Bead Society in 1983 was the first solid information that I received about it.

Amber is a wonderful, warm material. Not that I mean it "feels" warm, but it never feels cold when you first put it on, like stone. I sleep in it sometimes, both because it's good for the amber and it is supposed to have positive attributes. Whatever they are, they're good. Amber's all good.

It is some of the most faked and misunderstood material that beads are made of. Even if you provide documentation and tests, even sample cards, "you can't save everyone".

I could not resist. Disclaimer: No animals were hurt in the taking of this picture. One did however get a little irritated.