Fronds

This is where it started. My first textured piece, the first in what would become the Obsidian Botanicals series — and yes, I cheated. I used a stencil. I wanted to see if I could build a frond in texture before I trusted myself to do it freehand.

The hammered-metal resin finish wasn't planned either. I was finishing the piece and the resin did something I didn't expect — pulled itself into a surface like beaten metal. I almost panicked. Then I looked at it properly and kept it. It's a technique I'll use again when a piece asks for it.

Two panels, gold pigment caught in the pressed-frond texture, sitting on a black so deep it almost isn't there. The fronds carry across the join when the panels hang as a pair, or stand on their own as singles.

First attempt. First technique. First piece. The only thing every Obsidian Botanicals piece will share is the black. Everything else is free to be whatever the work needs.

The things that have lived get to live again — and become something that lives in another person's soul.