VALENTINE X 

American Witch’s Wand 

American Witch’s Wand represents a deliberate blending of ancestral wisdom with modern material reality. “Witches use what we have to do what we must.” Individually, these elements hold little monetary value within a capitalist system—fallen feathers, shed skin, found wood, scraps of yarn. Yet fused through the simple act of emulating the old ways, they become a powerful reminder of what my ancestors endured so that I might even exist. 

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As the child, grandchild, and great-grandchild of immigrants from around the world, much of my spiritual and religious study has centered on understanding the beliefs, syncretic practices, and survival strategies embedded in my lineage. Thus, this piece speaks to the theme Revealing Roots and asks viewers: How does this object make you feel? Why does it make you feel that way? And, most importantly, what are you going to do with that insight? 

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Artist’s Motivation / Origin of the Piece 

The origin of this wand was humble. I found a stick that felt unusually good in my hands. There was no grand plan, only curiosity. When I counted the natural wood spurs along the hilt and discovered they formed a symbolically significant number, I allowed intuition to take over. What began as “my nice pointing stick” became something much more intentional. 

Like this implement, I am an assortment of environmental elements assembled over time—heritage, geography, memory, adaptation. My father, like his mother, was from Venezuela, his father from Barbados. My mother is the granddaughter of immigrants from Ireland, France, and Germany, among other places. Each root leads here. Each migration, each survival story, each act of cultural preservation or necessary assimilation contributes to this object. 

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The wand was shaped in modern upstate New York—a place that is not native to me, but neither is it native to the starling whose feathers adorn it. And yet we are both wholly American. The piece embraces that complexity: displacement, adaptation, belonging, and contradiction all existing simultaneously. 

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Creative Process & Techniques 

My materials are rarely purchased but rather encountered. While gardening or walking, I’ll forage for items. Sometimes that means interesting rocks and sticks, but other times it means happening across the exact curio you needed at precisely the right moment, an encounter that challenges one’s sense of statistical probability. 

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The pear wood was shaped and cleansed by hand. After preparing the surface, I painted a white base layer, establishing both renewal and possibility. The natural spurs along the hilt were individually painted in chakra sequence, transforming organic irregularities into deliberate energetic markers. The yarn was wrapped tightly between the twin tines, binding color, symbolism, and structure together. The crystal chip was secured with red thread—an act both decorative and intentional. Feathers were cleaned and positioned with care, among them corvid, gull, and starling. The snake shed was wrapped along the hilt in a layered gesture of transformation and renewal. 

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During the process, sap unexpectedly emerged from the wood after the yarn had already been secured. It hardened into a small orange bump that now permanently anchors the wrapping. What might be considered a flaw became reinforcement—an unplanned collaboration between the living history of the wood and my design. 

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Symbolism & Interpretation 

Every element carries layered meaning: 

• Pear wood: growth and prosperity. 

• White paint: renewal, purity, and possibility. 

• Chakra colors: alignment and embodied wisdom. 

• Blue and white yarn: balance, and the oceanic crossings that shaped my heritage. 

• Crystal chip: clarity. 

• Red thread: fate and connection. 

• Corvid, gull, and starling feathers: intelligence, audacity, adaptation. The starling in particular—non-native yet fully American—mirrors my own sense of belonging. 

• Snake shed: transformation, rebirth, cyclical becoming. 

 

Together, these components speak to ancestry, syncretization, resilience, and identity. The wand is not a relic of a single tradition. It is an artifact of blending—of inherited fragments reorganized into something cohesive and alive. 

Relationship to the Exhibition Theme: Revealing Roots 

“Roots” can be physical, like the tree that offered its wood. They can be ancestral, tracing back through Venezuela, Barbados, Ireland, France, and Germany. They can be emotional—the formative experiences that shape one’s spiritual inquiries. They can be societal—the collective memory of migration and reinvention that defines American identity. 

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This wand reveals roots that are often invisible. It reveals the labor of belief. It reveals that American spirituality is not pure or singular—it is layered, borrowed, reconstructed, and continuously evolving. In contributing to this exhibition, the piece participates in a broader dialogue about origin stories: who we are allowed to be, what we carry forward, and what we choose to transform. 

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It invites viewers to examine their own assemblage. What materials—cultural, familial, ideological—compose them? Which were chosen? Which were inherited? Which are still being rewritten? 

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I am grateful for the opportunity to share this story within Revealing Roots, and to place this living implement into dialogue with other origin narratives.