Recently my best client, Naomi, asked me to shorten a necklace I had made from her in about 1978 or '79. Lately, she has asked me to make many necklaces short in length, and to redo or shorten older ones. I hope it's a phase....
When I first saw this necklace last week, I didn't recognize it—probably because I had seen it seldom or never since way back when. And in those days I didn't have a camera yet—so consequently many early pieces I did were not documented as well as I would have liked. But I can tell from the composition (including findings) and stringing techniques when I made it. (It has a stiff wire running through it, to hold the shape—something I haven't done for a very long time; and it had a simple, cheap commercial screw-clasp.)
In the early 1970s, I was, I believe, the first California artist (or maybe the first American) to take certain African beads and to combine them together into a structured necklace. At that time, "amber," brass beads ("Kirdi" from the Cameroons), and Venetian trade beads all came to us in strands that were not mixed. I had the bright idea of placing trade beads with a few "amber" beads, accented by carefully placed brass beads—and I made a number of these around that time (1971 or '72), and later. Of course, quite a few people since then have done the same thing.
Anyway, Here's that "old friend" again, now somewhat shorter, and now with a cowrie shell for a closure.
Jamey
