ORNAMENT MAGAZINE Volume 23.4 2000 - Part 2
I have little formal art training. I have taken my lessons as if I were a bee going from flower to flower extracting what information I could through workshops, mentors and personal experiments. With eyes wide open I have traveled around the world making pilgrimages to schools, galleries, museums and artists of the highest caliber. My greatest joy comes from sitting down with an experienced metalsmith gaining knowledge passed down through time. I have done this from the back alleys of old Cairo, Istanbul and Florence to the kris makers in the jungles of Java. There is something very grounding about this means of study; it reminds me how much I love my job and how blessed I am to possess talent. When I have gone to decay in the continual 8 rotation of this earth, the work of my mind, body and spirit will remain as a testimony of how amazing it was to have been here in the first place.
SEVEN ALCHEMICAL KEYS PUZZLE, of eighteen karat gold and platinum; 7. 0 x 7.6 x 0.6 centimeters, 1998. Photographs; Ralph Gabriner,
Artist Wayne Werner resides in Maryland.