August 2022, Part 1
There are so many reasons to purchase art jewelry…
- You got that hard-earned promotion—celebrate!
- You’re experiencing a once-in-a-lifetime occasion—honor it.
- You wrapped up that major accomplishment—pay it tribute.
- You want to mark the beginning of a new relationship or the end of one—commemorate it.
- Perhaps it’s an investment—do it!
- It’s the perfect piece to round out an aspect of your collection—pounce!
- Or maybe it’s as a treat for yourself—just because.
Art Jewelry Forum’s international gallery supporters celebrate and exhibit art jewelry. Our monthly On Offer series allows this extensive network of international galleries to showcase extraordinary pieces personally selected to tempt and inspire you. Take a look. You’re bound to find a fantastic piece you simply have to add to your collection! (Please contact the gallery directly for inquiries.)
Gallery: Baltimore Jewelry Center
Contact: Shane Prada
Artist: Andy Lowrie
Retail price: US$1,600
Andy Lowrie began his art- and jewelry-making practice in Australia at the Queensland College of Art, Jewellery and Small Objects Studio, where he earned his BFA in 2011. He moved to the United States in 2016 and earned an MFA in craft/material studies from Virginia Commonwealth University in 2020. Lowrie joined the BJC team in the fall of 2020 as the inaugural teaching fellow. Order #1 is part of Fulfillment, an exhibition that explores the experience of teaching a craft and sharing a passion juxtaposed in stark contrast to the extreme physical output demanded of American manufacturing and logistics.
Gallery: Gallery Loupe
Contact: Patti Bleicher
Artist: Annamaria Zanella
Retail price: US$3,000
Italian jeweler Annamaria Zanella’s focus is research into materials, the inherent poetry of the design process, and the subversion of commonly held assumptions about beauty and value. Some writers have referred to her jewelry as povera (poor), to Zanella a welcome contradiction in terms since her “microsculptures” are often crafted from distressed metal and banal substances. Nonetheless, Zanella also excels at working with the traditional mediums of silver and gold, and techniques like enameling and niello. Zanella is represented in numerous museums, including Musée des Arts Décoratifs, Paris; Kunstgewerbemuseum Berlin; Die Neue Sammlung – The Design Museum, Munich; Museum of Arts and Design, New York; Schmuckmuseum Pforzheim; Museo degli Argenti, Florence; Victoria and Albert Museum, London; Palazzo Fortuny, Venice; Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum, New York; and Swiss National Museum, Zurich.
Gallery: Sculpture To Wear
Contact: Lisa M. Berman
Artist: Teri Brudnak
Retail price: US$950
This piece was inspired by the Webb Telescope—the hexagonal shape is the same as the telescope’s. Brudnak was watching a documentary about the building of the telescope and has always been fascinated with space. “The moveable parts represent cosmic objects,” says Brudnak, “because everything in the universe is in motion.” The pendant/brooch is comprised of some of the elements from the 1980s used in TDM Studios designs (with Karen McCreary) for Star Trek: The Next Generation TV shows and films.
Gallery: Galeria Alice Floriano
Contact: Alice Floriano | Mariana Tostes
Artist: Namkyung Lee
Retail price: €780
Namkyung Lee has received a lot of awards in the last few years. She has developed a unique work style, mixing different techniques to create a very interesting final result. Her approach gives a sense of transparency to the photographic images in the jewelry. Her pieces explore dimensions and shapes, but they are also very light, so the jewels are not heavy at all. Her work intends to talk about different points of view through pictures taken from windows.
Gallery: Fingers Gallery
Contact: Lisa Higgins
Artist: Peter Deckers
Retail price: NZ$1,325
Peter Deckers has developed an international reputation as a ground-breaking conceptual artist. While he’s a highly skilled craftsperson, it is ideas—rather than beauty—that drive his practice. “He looks for what he calls the ‘surprising complexity’ of things,” wrote Stevan Eldred-Grigg, a historian and novelist, in his 2006 survey about Deckers, Choices of the Hand, “and then seeks to work his way into that complexity beneath a surface which at first can seem a kind of commonness, a sort of normality, neutrality or simplicity. Consequently, each work is unique. Deckers never repeats a design.” Originally from the Netherlands, Deckers immigrated to New Zealand in 1985 and has been the driving force behind many up-and-coming jewelers over the past 30+ years.
Gallery: Galerie Door
Contact: Doreen Timmers
Artist: Tatjana Giorgadse
Retail price: €3,100
The art of Tatjana Giorgadse (1987) is recognizable by its playfulness, frivolity, and the occasional wink. In her works, Giorgadse builds a story of contrasts: heavy materials with a rich and eventful history—such as stones—mixed with light materials that, in the greater timeline, have “just come into play”—plastics—or, as in this case, wooden blocks from children’s toys. This makes the composition exciting and contradictory. Giorgadse’s jewelry is not easily categorized. It moves between surrealism, expressionism, and pop-art, and is characterized by a particularly free spirit.
Gallery: Ornamentum
Contact: Stefan Friedemann
Artist: Ruudt Peters
Retail price: US$1,200
Ornamentum celebrates its 20-year anniversary with an overview exhibition, with several works from the Azoth series, by Ruudt Peters, in the show. This body of work, an exploration of the alchemistic transformation from crystalline solid to amorphous liquid, marks a milestone for the gallery. In reflection, Ornamentum co-founder Stefan Friedemann notes, “It had been in our minds that we would probably enter the art fair world at some point down the road, but with Ruudt Peters on board we decided that we should step up that year, and we presented Azoth at the 2005 SOFA fair, in Chicago, with each piece presented in a bowl of water upon an iron stand.” This step jump-started the gallery in its trajectory of exhibiting at international fairs soon after, leading to the co-founders’ acclaim as pioneers in the field, as well as a reputation for presenting the more challenging works and installation-based presentations.
Image: IMG_6962.jpg
Caption: Ruudt Peters, Azoth Ring, 2004, silver, polyester, 35 x 40 x 40 mm, photo courtesy of Ornamentum
Gallery: Galeria Reverso
Contact: Paula Crespo
Artist: Heejoo Kim
Retail price: €984
The growth that occurs in nature is a process in which invisible things are piled up to make it hard and strong. This work captures the process of how pearls and corals form in the blue ocean. Electroforming, a modern technique designed to replicate or protect the surface of metals like plating, performs the process of pearl formation made up of accumulated particles. Electrolyzed metal particles in a blue sulfuric acid solution repeatedly accumulate, thereby form a new shell. Running on electricity but very analogue, electroforming requires time and craftsmanship as if taking care of life.
Gallery: Four Gallery
Contact: Karin Roy Andersson
Artist: Yojae Lee
Retail price: €2,800
Insects are a classic motif throughout the history of jewelry. Scarabs, butterflies, and dragonflies swarm all over. The insects made by South Korean artist Yojae Lee have a size that changes the relationship to the wearer. The robotic creatures are both captivating and terrifying. By mixing different types of metals and leather, Lee creates artwork that captures you both figuratively and literally.
Gallery: Galerie Spektrum
Contact: Jürgen Eickhoff
Artist: Ruudt Peters
Retail price: €2,900
“I just presented the BARA-serie, by Ruudt Peters, on the art-Karlsruhe with great success,” says Jürgen Eickhoff. “I can offer you this brooch from the BARA series, with its deep and intense aura, which it has for everyone.”
Gallery: Galeria Tereza Seabra
Contact: Tereza Seabra
Artist: Tereza Seabra
Retail price: €3,300, plus shipping
We have all let ourselves get seduced by the magic of our childhood fairy tales: frogs that turn into princes, genii who grant us wishes, godmothers who save us from curses, or princes who heal us with kisses of love. But in the reality of our adult lives, when faced with events beyond our understanding and which we would make disappear like magic, our childhood heroes do not come to our rescue. The unintelligible and the manifestations of evil spirits and supernatural forces have always weighed on the destiny of men. For this reason and to fight the unknown, human lives have been sacrificed, temples built, gods invoked, and objects of protection, amulets, and talismans made to overcome the fear of the unknown.
Gallery: Zu design
Contact: Jane
Artist: Mio Kuhnen
Retail price: Pendant AUS$2,400; small brooch AUS$2,400; large brooch AUS$2,800
Mio Kuhnen’s intricately enameled collection is based on electron microscope images of the “scales” that make up butterfly wings. “This series is based on a recent scientific publication which highlights that few butterfly taxa are explicitly listed for protection by Australian legislation (Geyle et al., 2021). When I am not practicing as an artist, I am a scientist assessing major developments in relation to the federal environment legislation. As these butterflies are not listed under legislation, they aren’t ‘protected’ and, devastatingly, are not considered during the assessments even though they are critical in many ecological processes.” From the current exhibition at Zu design, Entwined – Mio Kuhnen and Helen Aitken-Kuhnen.
