The start point for my collaboration was the title Tool as Jewel, building on previous explorations of utility coupled with economics, the natural environment and the object, it also gave room to extend and translate earlier research into materials, techniques, wearable objects, images and text. It offered a brilliant opportunity to collaborate with several people; two writers,…
Initially I was curious about the relevance of collaboration to my singular and slightly isolated way of making. Through a masterclass with Hilde de Deckers in the early stages of HS3 (images attached) we were all encouraged to broadly explore what collaboration means both individually and as a group and in what form these…
I began the HS2 project in 2014 with the aim of exhibiting as much as possible to accelerate my practice after a hiatus for parenthood. After more exhibitions, masterclasses and jewellery travel opportunities than I could count, I definitely feel accelerated. I determined that I am my first audience, but that I have a real…
For our Objectspace piece, Liesbeth and I are focussing on the sensory action of touch, taking the opportunity to play with the taboo against touching that is usually enforced in a gallery setting. We both enjoy the signage employed to remind us of this and other restrictions on viewers. This from the British Museum: Liesbeth…
“Can you begin a process without knowing where it goes?” Iris Eichenberg 2011 At the start of our correspondence I warned Liesbeth about the not-a-straight-line nature of my process, and we wrote into our proposal for Objectspace: The work will develop through enquiry, experimentation and accident; space will be made for the unexpected; uncertainty and changes…
Liesbeth’s granny’s clock (“I’m fine with the fact that it has stopped working”) Well, I don’t know about great things. But: Plan – check! And Not quite enough time – …check… Also..Not quite enough money… Ticking all the boxes. Trifecta. Yay.
Unseen shows are top of mind for me as Liesbeth and I confer on how our Objectspace work will look. In Current obsessions 2 I write about exhibitions that I haven’t seen but, through description by others, are fixed in my memory as if I experienced them first-hand. Here’s a gem that Liesbeth and I both recently…
Quite apart from all the jewellery, Handshake has spawned some great T-shirts: (quick, head over to The Shop for yours). I’ve joked that I need one that says: and I should wear it all the time. At home, on my run, at work, at the studio, in meetings, on date nights, out and about, in…
Liesbeth and I want our collaboration to have a reach outside the gallery, and for inspiration I’ve been looking at public art initiatives that challenge preconceptions about where art belongs and when and where it might take place. I’m a long time fan of UK-based curator and writer Claire Doherty, editor of the book Situation and a proponent of…
Here’s a snippet of an article I came across yesterday in a cafe magazine: The artist is photographer Bruce Connew, the subject is his process for putting together his latest collection of images. Bruce’s process reads as gradual, logical, methodical – a measured progressive system: amass the many potential elements edit and refine sequence and…
In my teens I had a job delivering morning newspapers. Weekends were the heavy days; I can still feel the trough those lift-out supplements carved in my shoulder. One Sunday magazine carried a feature called A Life in the Day of…, where a person of interest described their day, revealing through their habits, interactions, hobbies and a couple of…
For the July exhibition at Auckland’s Objectspace gallery I am lucky enough to be collaborating with Liesbeth den Besten. Liesbeth is an independent art historian who works internationally as a writer, curator, advisor, jury member, exhibition maker, teacher and lecturer in the field of crafts and design, especially contemporary jewellery. She is chair of the…
Here are some things that are occupying my headspace at the moment. They may or may not feed into future projects. Hilde de Decker’s sublime Mirror and Flycatcher pieces, which were shown at AVID for the duration of Jewelcamp (thanks Jude Carswell for the images): My ongoing collection of books with gilt-edged pages (this was the first…
What a dream start to the year; the Handshake 3 Jewelcamp. We got to hang out together (a treat in itself) for an extraordinary week of jewellery immersion, including a workshop with Sofia Björkman, Swedish jeweller and gallerist extraordinaire (Sofia’s Platina gallery will be hosting our work in Stockholm later this year), followed by a Masterclass with Belgian…
HANDSHAKE 3 