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Unlike many artists, Barrett remains rooted in the themes that first defined her early work. Says Barrett, “I’ve gone through evolutions, but never a shift from my point… I think I keep changing as I am, but it’s always within the spirit of where I come from.” That place, that spirit, is movement, energy, and a harmonious submission to the artistic process itself. “Sometimes when I’m doing a figure, I can draw one out, but it goes where it wants to go. I’m part of the whole process,” Barrett explains. Her trust in that process recalls Michelangelo’s belief that form already exists within the material—that the artist’s role is not to create, but to reveal. As she puts it, “I don’t know where I’m going. I just allow it to be. When I’m doing sculpture, I hear it. It tells me things. And when I think I’ve got it, it humbles me quickly.”
Barrett feels privileged to create jewelry that becomes woven into people’s lives and family legacies. “My work is passed on for generations, now three generations of people… It’s not just events for some people, and it blows me away that the work is entangled to their lives, to the moments of celebration or joy,” she says.
Early in Barrett’s training, as a student at the High School of Music and Art, and later at Pratt, she primarily identified as a painter and sculptor. She recalls scoffing at the mandatory jewelry courses until she realized she could approach jewelry her own way, continuing to sculpt in wax. “I had to fabricate and learn the basics, but I fell in love with sculpting it. I could still cast and solder.” Her work quickly drew recognition, with two pieces selected for the Young Americans 1969 exhibition at Museum of Contemporary Crafts (now the Museum of Arts and Design) and its nationwide tour. Barrett’s work can now be found in museums, galleries, and private collections throughout the country.
The “joie de vivre” running through Barrett’s work was highlighted in a 2012 Art Times profile by critic Raymond Steiner, who noted that her jewelry carries meaning far beyond ornamentation. Steiner wrote: “seeing her work of art in the hands of another who senses its divine origins is not simply a “sale” – it is a profound sharing of self with other self, of sharing in the oneness that connects us all.” That spirit remains today. A few minutes at Barrett’s booth (Tent B, space 33) makes it clear that her exchanges with customers are not mere transactions. “Those who feel my work,” says Barrett, “they feel it. And the ones who do, feel deeply. It’s about empowerment. About spirit.”
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