DAVID BUTLER
What can I say? I like making things. That is an impulse that I can trace back to childhood. I am drawn to the metalworking process for the design possibilities that are presented with the material and the challenge that the process offers. I make jewelry to be unique, and wearable. I like using stones and other materials in the work, including gold, silver, and steel.
The work isn't always just about design. The ring in the above left image uses a casting created with a hemlock tree pine cone. Hemlock trees are disappearing up and down the east coast due to a small insect called the wooly aldegid, an exotic bug introduced to the US in the 1930's. As the last fifteen years became warmer, this insect scourge has decimated huge stands of the once ubiquitous tree. In a sense, this ring is a small memorial to the passing of the Hemlock tree from our lives.