Art is not what I do but it defines who I am. I started creating when my first daughter was born as I wanted to stay home with her and now 12 years later I have two beautiful girls and a successful family business. For years before I had kids I felt like a body without a voice and now I have found more than one. Jewelry making was my first venue of expression but over the years I have crossed into wearable fiber, photography, poetry, and mixed media. I love to explore different genres and my personal growth is reflected in my works. Ability to create art and stay at home with my daughters is a dream come true. Years of searching for myself have paid off and I am happy to share my gifts with customers. Over the years both my parents started helping me and created their own works. Even my husband and my daughters joined in and they travel with me to Art and Craft shows all over the East Coast and help me exhibit our family products. In the past I have collaborated with other artists and some of our joint projects will be present here for sale. Feel free to contact me if you have any questions and thank you for taking interest in Art Island shop. Save a trip to the mall and buy unique handmade artistic gifts :-)

If you are curious feel free to read about the creative process below...

I have been a professional Master Crafter/Artist specializing in filigree stainless steel wire technique for the past 7 years. I received my training in Moscow Russia at the private jewelry school where I lived as an apprentice for 6 weeks. After graduation I built my first studio in the back of our house in NC where I spend most of the time making jewelry. Every piece of jewelry is made from stainless steel wires that are hand woven and welded using spot welder. There are several stages in making each piece. First the frames are made. I have created steel plates in school and the wire is bent around them to shape the piece. Then all the leaves are hand woven separately to go inside the frame. Multiple short pieces of wire are cut to hold pearl, garnet, coral or amber beads embedded inside. All separate parts are laid out like a puzzle to complete the art piece and then welded one at a time until jewelry comes to life. Once everything is welded, the polishing and buffing stages complete the process. It takes a long time to make each jewelry piece. I do a lot of custom work so you can send me personal massages to request a special piece designed for the occasion.

My father Leo Khmelev creates all the jewelry holders in the studio that we share. He originally created unique stands for the Art and Craft Festivals to showcase my jewelry and many customers inquired about purchasing them. So he started making them for sale. Each jewelry stand has been cut out from the plywood and then thoroughly sanded. Leo applies two coats of paint to each stand and then glitter glue to finish the coating process. The stand holding the butterfly is the cut out from the wing and has two screws at the bottom to hold the frame. The bottom of the stand is not painted and shows natural wood. I helped staple the mesh to the back of each display.

In 2020 I have devoted more time to Mixed Media Fine Art thanks to collaboration with Portuguese artist Monica Hilario. “Let Love Rain” is a mixed media project that combines photography, painting, poetry, embroidery, sculpture and fabric design. It is my voice that better expresses a contemporaneous felling of simultaneous fragmentation and unity of humanking and nature. The “Moon Flower” androgenous nature is coupled with the instability of plaster, the velvety softness of ephemeral beauty and the sharp slivers of forms. “Triptych Skin Flower” is a feminine approach to the masculine edges of abstract art fusing visual and textural senses. “Night Dew” is the fluidity of light and dark in life and how it reflects in the translucency of the petals that absorb light similar to our skin and the droplets of water. “Falling in Love” is an attempt to materialize a feeling that can not be completely met just with one instrument, verbal or visual, but with the symphony of both.