seeing is just your best guess ...

Organically inspired fine jewelry hand fabricated in 18 K gold and oxidized cobalt chrome with black, white and cognac diamonds

Many, many years ago I was a wee, little girl from Kingston, Jamaica migrating to New York City and soon after to New Rochelle, NY. Even then, dreams of artistry danced in my head. When I was a girl, my artisanry came through in the clothes, tools, and structures I had to make for my dolls and action figures.

Throughout my 12+ years as an urban planner, I continued to add painting, sketching and metalwork to the repertoire. This collection, Urban Jewels, showcases jewelry inspired images of my travels through various cities.

SMAart Gallery & Studio was founded in September 2012 and opened its doors at 1045 Sutter Street in San Francisco.

SMAart offers gallery exhibits, studio rentals and ceramic classes.  While the center primarily caters to ceramic artists, artists of every media are welcome.  Founder Steven M Allen opened SMAart to fulfill a longtime dream of having a gallery, a place to teach art to the community, and a place to create art in a creative open environment surrounded by other inspiring artists.  

Conveniently located in the Lower Nob Hill neighborhood with access to several major bus lines.  SMAart is also positioned in the heart of the Lower Polk Art Walk offering participating artists access to a burgeoning art scene.

Elisabeth studied art and history in Paris and when she moved to the United States she started to design jewelry. When she travels around the world, she finds beautiful, antique, vintage or ethnic brooches and pendants that will become the focal pieces of her unique necklaces. She sometimes keep those incredible finds for years before finding the right stones to compliment them.She works with fancy semi-precious stones and precious metals.
For her, a necklace is like a painting, colors and textures have to flow and blend together. And like paintings, she signs all her necklaces and bracelets with her unique tag. 
She has been participating in artist’s open studios and art shows since 2003. 

Bay Area–based artist Woody Miller colors outside of the lines, having worked on everything from murals and corporate logos to travel paintings and t-shirt screen printing. He is inspired by the paradigm of a city and illustrates San Francisco street scenes. Since receiving his B.A. in Illustration from the Academy of Art in 2001, Woody has been selected in shows up and down the coast of California, including the city's STUDIO Gallery, Gallery Saratoga, and San Jose's Kaleid Gallery.

The wonder and mystery witnessed in the smashing together of humanity is what often draws one to the 'city'.  Each city, each village, every town, has it's own thumbprint created by the people who travel through and those who call it home.

Through painting, Woody's aim is to reflect the paradigm that is a city - the mingling and weaving together of various cultures, different bodies, all manner of food, beauty, style, and religions, to form a new identity. It is this coming together that creates a new city, with new character.

ABOUT ME     

My background is fairly diverse. I grew up with a WWII veteran father who was a radio operator during the war. With the classic DIY mentality of that age, my father built everything he thought up and as soon as I could hold a soldering iron, I was right there with him, grinning, watching the sparks fly and smoke come out.

Growing up I would spend hours every day making stuff up to build. Hacking and circuit-bending old surplus gear to the threshold of destruction, building something that held no “valuable” purpose other to satisfy my curiosity. Sometimes just to make smoke come out.

While I never completed any formal engineering training (electrical or otherwise) I taught myself what I needed to know to become a sound engineer, build and repair musical instruments, amplifiers and musician’s egos. This led me from Oregon to California in the mid seventies where many musicians roamed in need of such services. Not long after moving to San Francisco I joined forces with a partner, built a rehearsal/recording studio and shortly after was back on the road mixing live sound and rebuilding what was broken the night before.

Late in the eighties to gain some “consistency” and to “be home more often”, I took a swing at a “real” job which became another real job and so on and so forth until 2009 when a corporate stooge finally rubbed my last nerve. I pulled the plug and went back to making stuff up. I went back to school to learn welding, sculpture, metal arts, AutoCAD, Solid Works and I’m still going whenever I can.

MY WORK

Life seems overly complicated to me. It can conjure up vague, formless images as placeholders for ideas I don’t fully understand or care about. The work I create can go in any direction fleshing out these placeholders using any medium that suits my needs or is within arm’s reach. I often make jewelry, or giant fire breathing sculptures, or sound emitting objects, or things which either wave at or whistle with the wind. Occasionally I will explore an idea in different forms from small sculptures to painting to jewelry. Other times I will make a piece one way, one time only because it has satisfied my curiosity.

It is my intention to create thought provoking, one of a kind pieces of art. I started painting fabrics in 1972, this evolved into a fashion/wearable art business. My fabrics eventually went into the HOME DECOR market. I'm currently designing re-assembled jewelry, hand painted/dyed scarves/shawls/ wall hangings & mixed media collage..