Both of the amaz­ing instil­la­tions above were done by artist, Masao Yamada who works from Pine Island Art Stu­dio in Weeki Wachee, Florida. And while I haven’t for­got­ten that this is a jew­elry blog, the point I am mak­ing here is about scale, artis­tic aes­thetic and that adorn­ment, in so many ways, is also sculpture.

Sculp­tor and mod­ernist Alexan­der Calder was equally well known for his large sized pub­lic works and the per­sonal jew­elry he made at first for only his friends. He lost noth­ing in the trans­la­tion from going big to small and in fact adapted the many skills he uti­lized in jewelry-making to the sta­biles and mobiles for which he became renowned.

Yamada’s hand-worked cranes, crabs, flow­ers, seag­ulls, and star­bursts are made from intri­cately folded squares of paper; this centuries-old Japan­ese art form is called origami. Below are exam­ples of his pins, ear­rings and neck­pieces. Whether you are awed by the life-like appear­ance of the fin­ished prod­uct or cheered by its mul­ti­col­ored charm, its sculp­tural char­ac­ter­is­tics are what draws the eye and keeps it mov­ing along every edge and peak. I par­tic­u­larly like Yamada’s abil­ity to make asym­me­try poetic; it reminds me of the curl­ing petals of a flower as it begins to fade or the way a bird’s wing nat­u­rally yields to the changes in wind current.