Born and raised in Arizona, Carl Clark is from the Manygoats-Redhouse Clan while Irene is from the Edgewater Clan. Especially important to traditional Navajos, clans can trace ancestry as far back as 1,000 years.
Essentially self-taught (though they do have many relatives who are silversmiths and painters), the Clarks have been creating their distinctive jewelry since 1974. They are renowned for gold and silver bracelets created in gold and silver featuring micro-fine intarsia inlay using turquoise, coral, opal and other gems and stones. (Intarsia is the Italian word for marquetry, an inlay technique creating designs with many differently colored materials.) A bracelet created by these artists will often possess from five to six thousand tiny pieces. “Our jewelry takes much longer to make,” says Irene.
Though the artists did not pattern themselves after European or American designers, they discovered years after creating their pieces that the micro-fine intarsia technique was popular with the Art Nouveau and Art Deco eras.
Their intricate, beautiful jewelry, which they create together, has won numerous awards and has been exhibited at the Heard Museum in Phoenix and the Wheelwright Museum in Santa Fe. Numerous books, such as Enduring Traditions by Lois and Jerry Jacka and Southwestern Jewelry by Dexter Cirillo, have also featured their work.
|
