Yehoshua Star

October 2003
Sterling silver

April 2006
14 karat yellow gold

Variations I & II, 2005
Sterling silver

I had been wearing my grandfather's star for years prior to making the original sterling silver version of this star, but I decided that it would be a good idea to wear something that I had made (good advertising, right?) as well as something with my name instead of his. The simplest explanation of the symbol on the star is that it's an abbreviation of my Hebrew name, יהושע (Yehoshua), by taking the first and last letters and combining them. I particularly enjoy how the bold the negative spaces of the letters hold the larger metal sections together by delicate strands of silver.

As any good artist has at least some dose of ego, I also started creating variations on a the theme of this star whenever I wanted to play with a new metalsmithing style that I hadn't yet tried out. Variation I was done using the twin techniques of chasing and repoussé, and Variation II was done with reticulated silver on the Hebrew letters.