With the end of the year approaching I’m a little nostalgic. I keep thinking about last month’s trip to New York City and the question asked of me over and over,” Why are you here?” At first I’d answer in my most practical Midwest way,” I’m on vacation! Yay!” but then realized what was really being asked: What was my purpose (as in aspirations and determinations)? And so this refreshingly grounding inquiry came home with me to Chicago and is still on my mind.

Three years ago I started this site and it’s grown slow and steady. Often I wish to progress Ashes & Milk faster, grow it bigger, include more artists and their work, photograph artwork in amazing ways like Ditte Isager, increase sales through more aggressive marketing and restock sold-out pieces for all of you wonderful people who write asking me for more. -Perhaps I will give you just that, minus the fast part. Please bare with me because the truth is, I’ve always taken life slow to savour its details and in turn can promise to stay true to what this project is all about.

With all this said, I’m really happy to introduce to you the newest addition to Ashes & Milk, Geoffrey Lilge who created a collection of hand-crafted Wood Serving Boards.

Above are a few of Geoffrey Lilge’s Walnut Serving Boards. Each piece is a unique functional object fashioned by hand from a single piece of wood.

The story behind the creation of these boards is sweet and born out of love. Geoffrey sought to find the perfect cutting and charcuterie boards to outfit his wife’s restaurant. After about 4 years of prototyping and restaurant testing he came up with these beautiful simple solid wood boards.

A sneak peak of Geoffrey’s warm and inviting studio.

[ Be sure to check out the entire colleciton of Geoffrey's Wood Serving Boards
at Ashes & Milk. ]

[ For those of you in Canada, see Geoffrey's boards in action at Culina and Highlands Kitchen Restaurant. ]

The moment I laid eyes on the work of Anya Jindrich my heart beat faster and I knew her jewelry would be a wonderful addition to Ashes & Milk. Her pieces are hand-carved and designed to bring out the natural quality of each type of unique wood. Reclaiming bits of wood from other artisans, Anya’s method of sourcing her materials embodies the idea that “a lot can be created from very little.”

With all that said, I am so happy to announce that Anya created a very small and magnificent collection of her wood jewelry especially for Ashes & Milk.

Above left, is a collection of  Arrow Necklaces made up of a variety of woods. On the right, is a sculptural piece called Ebony Crescent Necklace.

The beautiful Anya Jindrich is at work in her studio (photographs courtesy of Leslie Williamson).

Nikko I’d love to talk a little bit more about your process of creation and what influences you and your work. Would you mind sharing these things? Could you tell me where you source the wood that you use. Does each piece have a story behind its design?

Anya Since the pieces of wood that I use are small, I am able to use offcuts from other woodworkers. I received a box of tiny offcuts from my dad that is full of beautiful and unique pieces. I just look through the box for a piece that sticks out to me and then I try to come up with a shape that might compliment what already exists in the wood. For one commission the customer supplied me with lilac wood that he wanted his jewelry made out of. I also find inspiration and ideas through my husband. He is a guitar maker, and we share our little shop space. We enjoy exchanging ideas with each other. I guess what actually got me started making jewelry was a pair of earrings that he carved for me. I always received a lot of compliments when I wore them, so I decided to make another pair to sell.

A pair of Ebony Earrings in the making (photograph courtesy of Leslie Williamson).

Nikko You mentioned that you are going to school for furniture making. Would you show me a sneak peak of some of the work you are doing along these lines?

Anya I completed the nine month furniture program a little over a year ago. Currently I am focusing on making jewelry. I enjoy the creative and meaningful process of working with my hands. I use knives and files to carve and shape each individual piece.

Above left is a stool that Anya made by hand. I just love the detail of the joinery in the middle image. On the far right, Anya is carving out joinery by hand only (no electric router).

A special thank you to the exquisitely talented Leslie Williamson who so kindly gave me permission to use her photographs.

[ Check out the full collection of Anya's hand-carved wood jewelry at Ashes & Milk. ]

Ashes & Milk is offering a new relief print by Bryan Nash Gill called Matching Oak as well a digital archival print of Ash.

Above is a 17″ x 21″ print called Matching Oak. The print block was prepared from cutting a white oak timber longitudinally down the middle and through the center of the log’s pith. After cutting two, one inch and a half blocks, the sections where glued together to create a complete round.

Scratching his fingernails over every surface of the tree while pressing little by little with his fingertips, Bryan imprints the texture of the wood on the surface of the paper. I love that Bryan had to touch each tree-growth-ring in order to deposit its mark. The actual texture, pattern and diameter of this tree section is literally translated onto paper. Go here to see exactly how Bryan creates these prints.

Above is a digital archival print from the original relief print Ash. It is printed on 100% cotton Hahnemule Museum Etching paper, weight is 350 gsm, and is certified archival. This archival reproduction is approximately six inches smaller on all sides from the original.

[ Check out more of Bryan's relief prints at Ashes & Milk. ]

One of my favorite things about artist Kia Neill is her consistent ability to create something extraordinary out of nothing. Her experimental techniques using unorthodox materials like reclaimed CDs to more conventional art materials like graphite or paint always amaze me.

Today I am excited to show you a new collection of esoteric paintings by Kia Neill called Residual Forms.

Above left is Residual Form 1 and right is Residual Form 25.

Nikko How did you come up with these pieces (the idea/process)?

Kia Actually, these evolved out of my previous graphite series of drawings, for which I repeatedly drew very thin graphite lines in succession to one another until form and imagery slowly developed. These works often looked sort of topographic. I was trying to think of how I could develop the process behind these drawings in another way.

Polypropylene paper is a synthetic paper, a plastic, and it reacts quite differently than other common papers as it doesn’t absorb wet medium, rather paint and ink have to dry in order to be set. So I planned to make puddles of thinned down ink on this paper and when one puddle was dry I would create another on top so to slowly layer and develop a series of rings from the dried puddles. However when I went in the studio to experiment with this, I thought, “I don’t have time for puddles to dry! How can I speed this up?” And so I thought of using a hairdryer to speed evaporation, but then of course the hairdryer started to move the puddles around. Something I didn’t think about but totally loved!

Using a hairdryer essentially as a paintbrush is pretty crazy and very unpredictable. It took me a while of just playing to see what kind of marks I could make and also what kind of compositions were most successful, but I still barely have control over the medium. The lack of predictability and control is actually an important factor for me though. I like to make discoveries while producing my work and to compromise with the medium in creating new forms. I do have to say that when making this work, it takes a lot of concentration and I have to be 100% present otherwise I just end up with a splatter painting!

Nikko Were you inspired by anything? I know you said that you’ve been spending a lot of time outdoors and traveling lately.

Kia I am heavily inspired from nature, biology, geology, archeology, the way people collect artifacts and the way nature is depicted in souvenirs and home decor.

With these drawings in particular, when I was experimenting and trying to determine what forms and compositions were successful and why, I was most happy with the drawings that felt like a figure of some sort, such as an amoeba, a mollusk body, a microscopic organism, etc. I’ve been looking a lot at sea creatures lately, and I’ve also been producing a series of sculptures that simulate oyster shells and bits of coral. I like the relationship of the drawings possibly depicting what type of fictional life forms could have inhabited my faux shells.

Also, while I was on a residency in the mountains of Colorado this past winter, I noticed a similarity between the mountain landscape with all the patterns and shapes of the dark tree lines, ski trails, snow capped peaks, clouds rolling through town, the roof tops of buildings, roads, lakes, etc, and the various shapes and textures I was creating in my drawings. I found this very exiting because I am also interested in the idea of a form that can function as a figure and as landscape. Perhaps this interest developed out of my fascination with coral has led to this, as what is coral? Plant? Animal? Rock?

{ To see more of Kia Neill’s paintings, please visit Ashes & Milk. }

Now that I have a little family of my own, I value even more so the passing of traditions from one generation to the next. My son Isaac is only a little over a year old but I hope he will enjoy making things with his hands like his mama.

On this note, I want to share with you a beautiful example of traditions taught and passed down to the next generation. The Tajika family has been producing handcrafted scissors and shears in Japan for over four generations. Each piece is hand forged and sharpened using traditional methods.

We are quite proud to be able to offer a collection of scissors and shears by Tajika Haruo Ironworks at Ashes & Milk.

Above right sits Haruo the 3rd working back to back with his son Daisuke, who is the 4th generation to carry on the legacy of Tajika Haruo Ironworks.

Each piece is made by hand through a very time consuming process. Above a metal blade is tempered by heat and shaped with a hammer.

The wooden handle of this hammer is gorgeously worn to fit the hand of the artist.

Sparks fly as Daisuke Tajika sharpens a scissor blade.

Haruo meticulously inspects each pair of shears.

{ You can order your very own pair of Japanese scissors through Ashes & Milk. }

Above are a few new pieces in Motley.

-And Swimmer Cups by Helen Beard.

Above is a stone from the 2011 collection of Pierres Graphiques. This is the fourth collection Yoran Morvant created for Ashes & Milk and I think that’s pretty magnificent of him.

See the whole collection right here.

I absolutely love simplicity especially in the form of organic minimalism, and am ecstatic to announce a new artist to Ashes & Milk who really captures the essence of this aesthetic.

Eunice Kim creates exquisitely saturated black and white collagraph prints onto chine collé paper. She delicately places each mark by hand to form an intimate map of cellular structures.

Above is Porous, a collection of collagraphy prints with chine collé by Eunice Kim.

Eunice was kind enough to share the details involved in her printmaking progress as well as some really great images of her working in the studio.

She works exclusively in the non-toxic printmaking medium of collagraphy, a process in which materials and textures are adhered to a plate surface, inked, and run through an intaglio press with paper for transfer of image.

Unlike traditional printmaking techniques, each plate has temporary life span. -Therefore each print edition is unique.

Eunice constructs the collagraph plate by putting down the modeling paste marks.

Taking a beautifully restrained approach by choosing to work only with very small dot marks, Eunice meticulously positions modeling paste on the plate surface a single mark at a time. She then carefully shapes each individual dot to height and contour optimal for printing. The dimensional differences of the tiny dots are almost impossible to discern by sight alone; therefore she relies heavily on her sense of touch during this stage.

Each dot is shaped to height and contour optimal for the printing process.

A completed collagraph plate inked, wiped. and ready to print.

Porous Collagraph Print #54

[ You can see more of Eunice Kim's work right here. ]

It was great to visit with Kia Neill over the holidays and preview her latest project Terrain, an installation where viewers walk through an intimately lighted, textured environment. It is being exhibited at the Women and Their Work Gallery from January 16 – February 27, 2010 and is a must see geological discovery for those of you in the Austin area!

Each of the crystal formations are made out of Compact Dics (CDs). What an ingenious and brilliant way to recycle materials!

I am also excited to show you more pieces from Kia’s new collection of work, shown below.

Kia created the sculpture Frost, shown above and detail below.

Exquisitely tactile and visually stimulating, Kia’s sculptures contain an unexpected use of materials such as paper-mache, plaster, steel, polyurethane, glitter and flocking fiber.

Below is another one of Kia’s pieces Geode, a small cavity of rock that is embellished with a splendor of rhinestone crystals and plastic flora.

[ You can see more work by Kia here.]

I am pleased to announce that Ashes & Milk is offering a new print by Bryan Nash Gill called Locust. So many of you have expressed a love of the print Hemlock 82, Bryan and I thought it would be nice to create a piece smaller in scale and in price. The result is a gorgeous 25″ x 20″ print showing a locust tree with a sub growth inside of it. The image of two coming from one speaks to me especially right now because I am halfway through my first pregnancy!

Byran created the above piece through relief printing and a laborious rubbing technique. Above, he rolls ink out onto the surface of a Locust tree cross section (the actual print block) and a piece of handcrafted washi paper is placed over the print block.

Scratching his fingernails over every surface of the tree while pressing little by little with his fingertips, Bryan imprints the texture of the wood on the surface of the paper. I love that Bryan had to touch each tree-growth-ring in order to deposit its mark.

The actual texture, pattern and diameter of this tree section is literally translated onto paper.

Bryan Nash Gill created Locust exclusively for Ashes & Milk.

[ You can see more work by Bryan here and here. ]