Look for Fernworks and other nature-themed artists at this month’s Big Crafty.

by Mary Ellen Phillips . photo by Carrie Wagner

Among cows, endless tobacco fields, abandoned apple orchards and the dirt roads of southern Appalachia, a young girl filled her pockets with moss, bones and other “small powerful things,” says Faryn Davis.  

Now 33, the Statesville, North Carolina, native is still collecting tiny natural ephemera and incorporating it into ethereal resin paintings and a line of resin jewelry. Davis, who grew up in Waynesville, was a UNC-Asheville art student but also studied in France, Italy and Nepal. It was in Nepal that she first encountered small ritual objects encased in resin or enshrined in temples by the side of the road. When she later became enamored with the misty, dreamy landscapes of the Pacific Northwest, she embarked on a ten-year residency in Seattle and later Portland with $800 in her pocket. She had no idea what would happen next. After months of saving, she rented a shared studio, where she began experimenting with resin and selling work.

One day, while working on a large resin piece, a small chunk fell off with a leaf inside. Not one to spurn serendipity, she drilled a hole into it and strung it on a necklace. The response she got while wearing it compelled her to make more. She began selling out as fast as she could make them.

After a stop on a small island off the coast of Seattle, she started making jewelry full time in Seattle. When she moved to Asheville last November, she joined the area’s hipster crafters, who imbibe their re-invented “grandma crafts” with an urban cool factor. Plenty of them will gather at this winter’s Big Crafty, a bi-annual handmade art fest in Pack Place. Davis’s work is also on display at the Chicago Museum of Contemporary Art and Atlanta’s Youngblood Gallery.

For more details on Davis, check out www.fernworks.org. For the scoop on The Big Crafty, which runs from 12-6pm on December 5 at Pack Place, go to www.thebigcrafty.com.