Mourning Brooch

In June of 2013 I travelled to West Dean College to immerse myself in the world of Robert Ebendorf's brooch making class. It was such a pleasure to get to study with this incredibly generous and talented studio jewellery legend. 

Robert Ebendorf
West Dean College, Chicester (June 2013)

The day I arrived for the course, I received a call from my mother telling me her twin sister died after a short illness. The news filled my head and heart, making it difficult to focus on the task at hand.

Deborah Abdou Schram and Valerie Abdou Wyckoff

My cousin posted this beautiful photograph of my mother and her sister as teenagers, which I had never before.

Lots of things to choose from

Looking for inspiration

I laid out my inspiration on the bench, trying to decide how to bring the disparate pieces together into a cohesive and meaningful brooch. My mother and I have always believed that making art heals the heart, so I decided to make her a Mourning Brooch for her and her sister. 

Copper "road kill"

I started with the rectangular piece of copper that my mother gave me on her last visit. She found it in the road and saved if for me. (Lord knows that lady is going to get hit by a car picking up "road kill" one of these days!) It has a beautiful fold revealing the most perfect patina underneath. I added two mismatched, but similar oval earrings which represented the the separate, but similar eggs in the womb. I thought this was a fitting analogy of the personalities of the twins.

Work in progress on the back of the brooch

Popular in Victorian Times, Mourning Brooches often depicted an image of the deceased, a locket of their hair or their initials. These funerary items where worn during the morning period as a way to remember the dead and mark their passage. It was a way of keeping their beloved close to them after they died.

I wanted to make the back of the brooch as beautiful as the front. I really thought about how to sandwich the piece together, but incorporate imagery into the construction elements. The oval element echoes the concept of the womb where the twins developed together.

Mourning Brooch (front view): copper with gold plate oval earrings 

(Verso): Copper structure, b/w Xerox mounted on book board,
 enamelled element on sterling silver, steel brooch pin in brass holder

I was really pleased with how the piece turned out. It isn't really my usual style, but I learned a lot from it. Not only that, I was able to sit with my grief for a bit and think about my mother and her sister, who they were and what they meant to each other.