art and ritual as inspiration

Kayapo headdresses

One of the inspirations for making jewelry is my love of art, especially from ancient and tribal cultures. Throughout history and in cultures around the world, feathers have long been used as body ornamentation and in rituals. I came across this exhibition “Spirits and Headhunters: Vanishing Worlds of the Amazon” at the Houston Museum of Natural Science. The exhibition records the mostly-ceremonial dress worn by the few remaining indigenous groups from eight regions of the Amazon. They are an endangered species; only 100,000 remain from a population estimated at 3-5 million prior to the arrival of Europeans. The exhibition is a reminder that body adornment is man’s original art form. Applying cosmetics and dressing-up for special occasions is highly traditional. While a few of the pieces were described as every-day dress, most were for ceremonial use and the most extravagant were usually worn by the shamans.