Alexis Pavlantos
Alexis Pavlantos grew up in the mineral heartlands of Tijeras, New Mexico. The daughter of a gemologist and goldsmith, at a young age she was immersed in jewelry and rock culture. With this acquired and hereditary passion for creating, she continued her studies at University of New Mexico, where she obtained her BFA in sculpture. After graduation she moved to the Bay Area in order to pursue a career in the arts. With limited space to create and a background of metalsmithing attained by childhood knowledge of her mothers practice, Alexis decided to combine the two worlds making wearable-art.
Alexis makes all of her jewelry by hand in Oakland, CA. She considers her process to be a transmogrification of her inexplicable depth of feeling into concrete material forms. She works with wax to give shape to her feeling-forms and solidifies them by casting them into metal.These forms resemble those found in nature, tying her inner world to the outer efflorescence she feels resonating in her core while immersed outdoors. She creates jewelry to collaborate with the human body. These embellishments interact as an extension of the body, thus nature is not something we set out to find, but is something we are apart of.
