May 2026, Part 1
Art Jewelry Forum is pleased to share all jewelry news. If you’re a member of AJF, you may add news and ideas to this bi-monthly report by submitting here. If you aren’t a member, but would like to become one, join AJF here.
Some of the news items below have no accompanying images. AJF regrets not having the staff capacity to request imagery and permissions from nonmembers. You may send us a high-res image (1 MB or larger) for a news listing that concerns you by emailing our managing editor at nathalie [at] artjewelryforum [dot] org. We will promptly add it to the corresponding newsbyte.
AJF WEEKEND: MONTREAL
AJF Weekends are a new way to gather with Art Jewelry Forum: shorter, more accessible programs that preserve the depth of exchange, access, and conversation that define AJF travel. Open to members and nonmembers alike. Cohosted with gallerist Noel Guyomarc’h, our first two-day, small-group program, in Montreal, will center around the opening of Dispatch from the Colonies, a new exhibition by South Africa–based artist Geraldine Fenn at Galerie Noel Guyomarc’h. Developed through the AJF Solo Exhibition Award, this exhibition represents the culmination of an extended period of research and making. Also: visit Aurélie Guillaume’s studio; curator-led tour of Wearable Art, at Musée des métiers d’art du Québec; curator-led visit to the newly reinstalled national museum galleries; celebratory dinner; and more. Info.
FEEL LIKE SEEING A JEWELRY SHOW?
Find listings from around the world on our dedicated exhibition page.
EVENTS
We have a dedicated page for them. Go here to see the list.
NEWS FROM OUR MEMBERS
MAD ABOUT JEWELRY: MAY 5–9, 2026
Now in its 26th year, the pop-up brings together 45 creators from more than 20 countries, including England, France, Italy, Japan, Korea, Argentina, Scandinavia, the Middle East, and beyond. As the only American museum with a gallery dedicated exclusively to jewelry, MAD has spent over a quarter-century championing this medium. Info.
MATRICES, WORK BY ROBIN DERIAZ, AT BORAX
A cage and a nest share the same anatomy: an empty space delimited by a material boundary, capable of protecting just as much as of enclosing. This exhibition will explore the point where these two concepts intertwine and merge, and it takes place in a disused prison. There, Deriaz will question the way the conditions of a space influence how we feel about it. Silver, copper, steel, aluminum meet organic matter such as resin or fibers. This mix references both the language of the nest and of the cage. It’s a study of the empathy of matter: aggressive structures attempting to protect fragile interiors, and vice versa. The cage and the nest are no longer opposites but equals. The body becomes the territory. Each piece exists as an autonomous ecosystem resting upon the skin. The wearer becomes the guardian of these spaces, the host who allows the object to exist. May 30–31 and June 6–7, 2026,13:00–18:00. Opening reception with the artist on May 30 at 18:00. More.
3RD LISBON CONTEMPORARY JEWELLERY BIENNIAL—SEPTEMBER 17–27, 2026
With Coexistências/Coexistences, the biennial will reflect on how jewelry expresses and represents the web of relationships between humans and the Earth’s ecology in the broadest sense. This edition focuses on an urgently relevant theme: our ecological survival and the place of the human in the 21st century. Artists explore utopian spaces and alternative realities, combining fiction and spirituality to suggest new and radical forms of coexistence. Activating the power of imagination becomes a liberating exercise in cosmopolitics, proposing connections to other systems of knowledge—such as mysticism, magic, and Indigenous epistemologies—as well as to artificial intelligence as a new way of organizing and understanding the world. Registration is now open for the masterclasses with Ted Noten and Sofia Bjorkman. Info.
NACRE AND THE GRAIN: CONTEMPORARY JEWELLERY AND THE SCOTTISH LANDSCAPE
At V&A Dundee, May 29, 2026, 10:30–11:15. In this free presentation, Kristin Beeler and Professor Emeritus Dr Sandra Wilson explore how Scotland’s landscapes inspire contemporary jewelry. From the sourcing there of natural materials such as pearls (nacre) to scientific techniques to recover precious metals from electronic waste (grain), learn about the underlying connections between landscape and contemporary jewelry. Meet Scotland-based jewelers and see a showcase of their work. In collaboration with AJF and Craft Scotland. More.
HEATHER GUIDERO: MOSAIC, AT JEWELERS’WERK GALERIE
Formally trained at RISD, Guidero worked as a goldsmith for renowned jewelry company Reinstein/Ross in New York before launching her namesake collection in 2005. The exhibition runs through May 30, 2026. More.
TEREZA SEABRA’S COLLECTION GOES ON VIEW THIS YEAR
It will be shown at Lisbon’s MUDE. The exhibition opens September 17, 2026, in conjunction with the 3rd Lisbon Contemporary Jewellery Biennial.
JELO6 ATHENS ANNOUNCES ITS PROGRAM
The festival takes place May 13–17, 2026. Find the list of events here, and see the participants here.
RÉKA FEKETE HAS PASSED AWAY
The Hungarian visual artist and jewelry maker (1982–2026) was ill with cancer for the last six years. She had lived in Amsterdam since 2004. CODA’s director, Carin Reinders, remembers her here. Learn more about her work in AJF’s review of the monograph A Dance of Light and Shadow here.
OPENING CELEBRATION FOR MYSTIC MEADOWS, AT PISTACHIOS—YOU’RE INVITED!
June 6, 2026, 4–7 pm. Enjoy champagne and charcuterie at the downtown Chicago gallery as you mingle with fellow jewelry enthusiasts or chat with the knowledgeable team to learn more about these incredible works of wearable art. Mystic Meadows is an ethereal exhibition with dark undertones. Featuring nature-inspired work from four Swedish artists—Hanna Liljenberg, Karin Roy Andersson, Märta Mattsson, and Sofia Bjorkman—the exhibition addresses themes of transience, rebirth, and the tension that lies between beauty and decay. More.
NEWS FROM ALL AROUND
GLITTERY AND SMOKY POP-UP
At Galerie Viceversa, though May 30, 2026, with work by Sophie Hanagarth and Takashi Kojima. Hanagarth traveled throughout Japan to study artisanal tools and techniques. “Here,” she declares, “objects have a soul; sword blades take on human characteristics to appeal to a female audience. My formal universe world feels both familiar and distant; I explore a bestiary-like realm, using images from astral mythologies as intermediaries for prayers and superstitions.” Kojima arranges faceted stones into vertical sculptures. These intertwine in a play of acrobatic tensions, with light and color guiding our gaze. More.
AUCTION: MAY 7, 2026
Rago’s Spring Jewels + Watches sale incudes work by Paul Derrez, Tone Vigeland, Andrea Wagner, Ford Forlano, Bettina Speckner, Earl Pardon, Joyce J. Scott, Erich Zimmerman, Ibram Lassaw, Michael Good, Ulla and Martin Kaufmann, Gijs Bakker, Giampaolo Babetto, Manfred Bischoff, Emily Cobb, Peter Chang, Svenja John, Esther Brinkmann, Märta Mattsson, Doug Bucci, Bruno Martinazzi, and others. There’s also plenty of beautiful but conventional bling. More.
EJAN PRESENTS A NEW EXPERIMENTAL ART JEWELRY PROJECT
Using caramelized sugar as a sculptural and symbolic material, the work investigates fragility, transformation, preservation, and desire through wearable forms that blur the boundary between organic matter, ornament, and contemporary art. By using a material rarely associated with jewelry, the project opens a dialogue on impermanence, sensory memory, and the emotional value of ephemeral substances. The initiative is developed by Gianluigi Ruju, artist, designer, and creative director based in Milan. More.
SUBTILE SCHÖNHEIT
Yūgen—that mysterious grace which alludes to the invisible or inexplicable and constitutes a fundamental principle of Japanese aesthetics—can be discerned in Maria Rosa Franzin and Kazumi Nagano’s works: tiny flecks of gold, as if painted upon blackened silver, and ethereal forms created through folding. At Galerie Slavik through May 30, 2026.
MAMDANI CALLS FOR RETURN OF KOH-I-NOOR DIAMOND
On the occasion of King Charles III’s visit to the US, the mayor of New York said the UK should return the colonial plunder. More.
BEAD PROJECT TRUNK SHOW, MAY 20, 2026, 3–6 PM
The Bead Project is a scholarship program which supports economically disadvantaged women, femmes, and gender non-conforming individuals in NYC. Join in celebrating the Spring 2026 cohort at the trunk show. Shop small to support these artists! Info.
FREE WEBINAR: INTRODUCTION TO COST CALCULATION FOR ARTISANS
May 19, 2026, 12:00-13:00 (Netherlands). Using practical worksheets, learn how, as a craftsperson, to calculate a good workshop or hourly rate. You’ll understand how you derived the rate and be able to explain it to your clients. Taught by Paul Hartgers. Register here.
BENEDIKT FISCHER WINS FRANÇOISE VAN DEN BOSCH AWARD 2026
Congratulations! The jewelry maker, who may be best known for his Pearly White brooches, explores the interplay between nature and culture, a theme deeply rooted in his upbringing on a farm in Austria. His work is in the collections of MAK Vienna, Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, Auckland Museum, the Dallas Museum of Art, and the National Gallery of Victoria. More.
EDWARD LANE MCCARTNEY AT HCCC
On April 30, 2026, the art jeweler was the guest speaker at the Houston Center for Contemporary Craft’s Spring Luncheon program, which celebrated the organization’s silver anniversary and honored it co-founder.
US MINT DISSIMULATES GOLD PROVENANCE
The US government requires that its investment-grade coins be made of 100% American gold. The US Mint’s website declares that the coins celebrate America’s heritage and principles. Yet the NY Times has found that the US Mint is the “last link in a chain that launders foreign gold, much of it illegally mined.” There’s American heritage and principles for you. The Mint has looked the other way for decades as gold enters its plant from foreign sources. Many are unethical and foster human rights abuses: a mine owned by a Colombian drug cartel, a Congolese mine owned by the Chinese government, a Honduran mine that dug up an Indigenous graveyard to get to the gold beneath it. Bravo. More.
PAGES SPOTLIGHTING JEWELRY
ANGELA SIMONE: EMOTIONAL PAPER JEWEL 2004 | 2024
Angela Simone, a graphic designer and artist, has been fully dedicated to creating contemporary paper jewelry since 2003, soon becoming one of Italy’s leading figures in the field and gaining international recognition. Inner meditation, the philosophy of color and form, sustainability, and respect for nature are key themes. Curated by jewelry historian Bianca Cappello, with contributions from prominent artists, intellectuals, and entrepreneurs in the paper industry. Be enchanted by the expressive potential of corrugated cardboard and cellulose pulp. More.
QUEER CRAFTS: MATERIAL PRACTICES AND THE MAKING OF IDENTITY
A nuanced study of the dynamic intersection of queerness and craft, this book examines metal, textiles, ceramics, wood, paper, and glass. Author Daniel Fountain demonstrates how LGBTQ+ practitioners—including Hansel Tai and Affect Metals—use these materials as powerful vehicles for self-expression, community building, and social critique. Reframing craft through a queer and trans theoretical lens, the book analyzes how these practitioners reclaim histories, rewrite narratives, disrupt hierarchies, and craft their own worlds. Get 20% off your copy by using promo code AJFQUEERCRAFTS when prompted at checkout: https://www.bloomsbury.com/queer-crafts-9781350359352/. Offer expires midnight May 19, 2026.
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