Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Carolina Sephra Reyes. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Hi Carolina Sephra, thanks for joining us today. Have you been able to earn a full-time living from your creative work? If so, can you walk us through your journey and how you made it happen? Was it like that from day one? If not, what were some of the major steps and milestones and do you think you could have sped up the process somehow knowing what you know now?

As of right now, I am working towards earning a living as a full-time artist; I currently work as a Case Manager for Individuals with Disabilities during the week and as a Gallery Manager at a retail shop called The Hood New Mexico on weekends. Both of these jobs allow me to pursue my passion for metalsmithing and jewelry and though I hope to one day have the option to fully support myself with my jewelry designs, I feel these “day jobs” are very necessary parts of my journey as a creative. At The Hood, I have a plethora of networking opportunities working with other makers, organizations, and business owners in the Las Cruces/El Paso area. Through Case Management, I have the ability to share my slice of the art world with Neurodivergent individuals within our community and advocate for them.

Carolina Sephra, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

I am a metalsmith and jeweler living and working in San Miguel New Mexico, a small town in Southern NM. I took my very first metals class as an undergrad at New Mexico State University (NMSU) in 2012 trying to fill up the required electives and I was hooked. I had no idea a person could major in such a thing! I graduated in 2015 with a Bachelor of Fine Art, Emphasis in Metals and Jewelry. I sought out a graduate school that would expand on concept, technique, and that had a strong community of metalsmiths. I found East Carolina University (ECU) in Greenville, North Carolina. Throughout my three year graduate career at ECU, I served as the Gallery Director for the Mendenhall Student Center Galleries which grew into managing three spaces across two campuses. It was an amazing opportunity that allowed me to branch out of the metals department and connect with not only the other medias in the art department but the ECU campus as a whole. I was also a co-chair for the 2019 ECU Metals Symposium, a nationally attended conference that brings in students and professionals in the metalsmithing community across the country and beyond. It is a wonderfully accessible conference that offers many networking opportunities and I’d encourage anyone to attend. I moved back to my hometown and taught as an adjunct professor of Metals and Jewelry at NMSU during the Fall 2019 semester and started work as a Gallery Manager at The Hood New Mexico. When the COVID-19 pandemic hit the following year, I struggled along with everyone else to figure out how to continue my craft. With our conferences and symposiums canceled or postponed and stay-at-home orders in place, I was trying to think of a way to continue networking and maintain communication between makers. One of the things I most looked forward to when attending conferences were the pin swap icebreakers that usually kicked everything off. I came up with the Pandemic Pin Swap, a virtual pin swap open to all media and run through Instagram that could feature up to 26 participants per round. The selection was on a first-come first-serve basis and each artist was responsible for a small application fee and shipping their piece to me. I would then host the swap on Instagram Live using a hat-picking style raffle selection. I would then ship a new piece to each artist. The idea was that each artist who sent in a pin would receive a different pin along with that artists info and Instagram tab. My goal was to provide a virtual way to network with new artists and an outlet to work through any potential “makers block” the pandemic brought with it. I was able to host three rounds, and although the project is currently on hold, I would love to continue hosting pin swaps in the future.
My most recent and exciting project is paired with a local makerspace called Cruces Creatives. We are working diligently to bring a community metals space/jewelry center to Las Cruces where we will host classes, workshops, and events centered around metals and jewelry to the public. In doing the initial research for this project, I’ve been able to connect with other metals studios like FUSE Jewelry Collective in Eugene, OR, and The Bench Jewelry Studio, RI. Speaking with the stellar individuals who have gotten their projects up and running has been so inspirational and given me even more fuel and motivation to bring a metals studio to my area.
Throughout all of this, I continue to work on my own line of jewelry and adornment, as well as take on customs and repairs. My main techniques revolve around piercing, enameling, and vessel forming, though I enjoy experimenting with setting, hollow forms, fabrication, and really anything that a custom requires. Earlier this year in January, I had the amazing opportunity to work for a whole month at Penland School of Crafts during Winter Residency. In addition to connecting with other makers from around the world, I focused on raising and forming in the Metals Studio. I am in the process of expanding my home studio to encompass raising more easily and continue exploring vessels and forms.

Looking back, are there any resources you wish you knew about earlier in your creative journey?

In school we are taught technique, concept, theory, and every so often, networking, but we are rarely ever exposed to the business aspect of being a maker. I feel makers would benefit so much from a “business for creatives” class in college. Even if there were a few outside sources immediately available to students that were known and actively disseminated so that the information wasn’t so obscure and mysterious, we would have a better understanding going into the business aspect of art. A couple of my go-to’s: there is a fabulous virtual conference called the Halstead Jewelry Business Forum that I would encourage anyone to look into, and Megan Auman has some wonderful business resources on her website as well. https://www.halsteadbead.com/info/jewelry-business-forum

Is there something you think non-creatives will struggle to understand about your journey as a creative? Maybe you can provide some insight – you never know who might benefit from the enlightenment.

With the way the world works right now, this whole concept of “quick fix”, fast food, fast fashion, and wanting everything at our fingertips for the least possible amount (don’t get me wrong, I’m guilty of this too), I think it’s hard for non-creatives to understand the sheer amount of time that goes into our practice. Whether it’s the start to finish of a piece or the time we put into the studio accomplishing all the other things it takes to run the business side of our craft. There’s also the aspect of balancing our home life with our art life. Many of us work day jobs or have families that demand a portion of our day, and it takes energy to devote time to our studios to make the piece, document process, photograph, advertise, and then send it off to where it needs to be. Not to mention ordering supplies, reaching out to galleries, applying to shows, hosting sales, I can just go on and on. I think as creatives, we need to look for any opportunity we can to help people understand how we make what we make. I think with understanding the process, even just a taste of it, our audience is able to appreciate what they’re looking at a little bit more and see the work from a different perspective.

Contact Info:

• Website: carolinasephrareyes.com
• Instagram: @csr12

Image Credits
My bench photo was taken by Marcus Xavier Chormicle. Work photos were taken by me. The figure in one of my photos is Lorena E. Reyes.