Alison Mackey

Artist Statement / Biography

I have worked with many mediums along my path. In college, I took every art class offered at College of the Atlantic, and I spent time as an apprentice to a potter. In 1997 I was lucky enough to land a job working for an established metalsmith in Maine, Sam Shaw. It was there that I found jewelry making, the medium that would carry me through life feeling inspired and fulfilled.

While working for Shaw, I created a unique line of jewelry that satisfied my love of nature as well as creating beautiful things from unexpected materials. Nature, seen through a macro lens, can be almost gem-like. I developed a method using pieces of photographs of flowers and leaves, pouring silicone resin over them, and then setting them into fine metal. The result was just as beautiful as any gemstone. For seven years I traveled around the country selling this colorful jewelry at craft shows. You could find it in fine art Galleries and Museum gift shops as well, including The Chicago Art museum and The De Young museum in San Francisco. Then in 2009, I took a hiatus from metalsmithing when I had my daughter and embarked on a different creative path, motherhood.

Fast forward to 2018, when my husband, daughter and I moved to Hancock, NH. It was the Monadnock Art Tour itself that brought me back to my studio. Inspired by artists' work and spaces, I found a new direction with my own art, and an all-new line of jewelry was born. For this line, I was driven to create something new from the old, capturing the dark and light that lives within us all. The yin and yang of life blossoms into each new piece: oxidized sterling is bold and exotic, in contrast with the bright, clean finish of fine silver. Bold yet feminine, each piece is empowering, eye-catching, and both elegant and wearable. This body of work is right for everyone.