Magic Boxes

Artist Statement

Talisman objects — either horse tail, goat, donkey or buffalo fur, plus wild sage, a vial of collected rain water and a 1941 photographic print taken by my father are sealed together, inside a repurposed wood box, wrapped in appropriate book pages, fine art photographic prints, and handmade paper, held together with encaustic wax medium. Each unique Magic Box was created with the intent to attract positive energy from the universe to allow good luck to their owner, and to support positive transformations in their lives. The best gift you can give someone you love.

By 2007, I had become bored with creating my art via computer and presenting work behind glass. I wanted people to experience my work in more interactive ways and began to experiment with mixed media. That same year, I encountered an encaustic wax exhibition while preparing for my own one-person show at the same museum. One piece incorporated a photograph and I was immediately taken with the result — I knew that learning this difficult process would be my next creative pursuit.

Encasing photographs in aromatic beeswax combines an ancient medium created by the Egyptians with the modern technology of digital photography. It allows me to create 3D objects rather than 2D framed prints. The objects invite touch and smell along with sight. The sculptural process is additive and subtractive — messy and far more physical than the sedentary work of digital photography.

The combination of past and present, and the transformative process of melting and cooling wax, seems to open portals to other dimensions. Uninvited spirits have sent messages through my work along with other odd occurrences over the 15 years I have worked with encaustic wax. Creating these boxes seems to have created the most powerful connection yet.

Encaustic wax led me to Santa Fe in 2014 — I came for a workshop that took place on my 60th birthday. I closed my Venice Beach studio after 22 years and moved to Santa Fe in 2016, eventually finding a property in Arroyo Hondo where I felt a similar creative vortex that had drawn me to Venice. We transformed it into a horse ranch with art studio in 2020.

Each talisman on its own is powerful, but by encasing them in wood, wrapping them in art, and holding the elements together with beeswax allows them further power to help transform the holder's life in positive ways.