20 September 2009

duality

'every one is a moon,
and has a dark side he never shows to anybody.'
- mark twain

this 'duality' necklace started with the raven bead from mak of maku studios... it had a mythical feel to me, as the raven has been surrounded by legends for centuries and from all over the globe... even carl jung wrote about this bird... unfortunately, the raven often gets a bad rap due to its superior job performance in the natural world as a scavenger... 
the norse god odin had two ravens that accompanied  him at all times... in welsh lore the raven is associated with wisdom... but i love the stories about how the raven brought light when it left the darkness of the cosmos... the light of understanding... and from this, jung came up with his teachings of the raven representing the shadow self, or dark side of the psyche... our dark sides must be acknowledged and examined in the light of our conscious selves... there we find balance...  

the center two rings of the pendant represent coming full circle in understanding... the spiral of the infinite, a beautiful bead by mary ann at linden avenue designs (all glass in this piece by mary ann) & a shimmering piece of labradorite which is thought to enhance clarity of thought... from there we find another glass bead by mary ann that you can see into the depths of ... a white crackle raku bead to counter the dark raku disc and glass on the other side... and a hammered, antiqued sterling blank with 'self' imprinted upon it... reminding us that all facets of the self must be acknowledged to be complete...


a breast cancer awareness bracelet made in sterling with rhodonite and ceramic... the words hope, love and believe are stamped on sterling discs... believe has a fluttering butterfly on it, representing the growth & change that only a struggle can provide us with... 

6 comments:

  1. WONDERFUL! Both the piece and your wonderful post! Thanks for sharing!

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  2. Love the Mark Twain (a fellow sagittarian) quote and the story of the raven. So true. You've created yet another inspirational piece of art Maire. Beautiful! Thanks for including my raku in your work.

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  3. I bet Samuel Clemens would enjoy this post as Twain means two from the middle english twene. I wonder if he considered the duality ? I bet he had a chuckle or two.

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  4. Really nice, and I like that your jewelry has a story with it.

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  5. Lovely, as always, Maire!! We never see real ravens here, as they only live in the mountains; only crows, but they are very intelligent birds. Maybe one of the reasons they are associated with wisdom.

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  6. Love the raven story and the Jungian interpretation. Your work is as always beautiful.

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