Follow my HS3 journey here

About Sarah Walker-Holt

Since graduating from MSVA in 2010 I have been testing the tactile qualities of wearable objects while exploring domestic wooden utensils and vessels as my material of choice.

As a Handshake 2 participant, where I was mentored by Helen Britton, I initially concerned myself with trying to balance the areas I was straddling between contemporary jeweller and a visual artist. This instigated exploration around presentation and the varying degrees of change-ability, within a piece, that I would allow the wearer to have within a participatory composition.  Simultaneously, I developed mechanisms that not only allowed the wearer to make these changes to a piece but also become part of a pin. I then went on to develop a tool and integrated it into a brooch, to assist handling the mechanisms that orchestrated the compositional changes.

 

 Towards the end of Handshake 2, I came to the conclusion that I had come full circle with the tactile exploration and that a significant change was underfoot. The four necklaces I made for our final exhibition at Pah Homestead became what I declared ‘the beginning at the end’, with both Helen and I agreeing that these pieces ‘had not yet blossomed’ and their deeper context yet to form.

I am now eager, for handshake 3, to investigate the new path that these pieces are leading me down while embracing what I learnt from my 2 years with Helen, concentrating on the individual pieces, their mechanisms, components, wear-ability and presentation in explicit detail and unison.

For more background can see my Handshake 2 journey here                                                      And also visit my blog sarahwalker-holt.blogspot.co.nz