We recently read a new book on the subject, and will quote a couple of paragraphs clarifying what art jewelry is. It seems that, nowadays, anyone who produces a handmade item is an artist. The market is flooded with jewelry artists, in fact. The truth is that art can be and normally is handcrafted, but what is handcrafted is not necessarily art. This is an important distinction to be made. However,“(d)oes jewelry have a specific character?...Is it art, fashion or design? The ambiguity emerges from the symbolic, social, and material changeability of the jewel, which wavers between an investment and an ornament, a one –of-a-kind object and an item made in series and so on, in a well-lit and multi-hued intertwining of value and meanings”. 1)
“Sweeping changes have taken place in the jewelry sector in the past few years that have introduced a wide range of materials and forms of ornament radically new and in some cases revolutionary ones, from every standpoint of jewelry production. (...)A new generation of designers…seems to be favoring the use of heterogeneous materials, in some case almost devoid of intrinsic value (…)Art or research jewelry is born from an autonomous creative intent open to new formal solutions .(…)The expression of a new boundary between an item of jewelry and an ornament, and between creativity and research,…give rise to jewels that are…non-conventional, where the preciousness of the object is not channeled by the materials, but by the value inherent in the idea and the project.” 2)
Ultimately, art is in the eye of the beholder, as it must evoke some feeling in the observer. The subject has been discussed for centuries by various disciplines, and nobody has come to a specific conclusion. What is art to me may not be to you, but typically if you see it in a gallery or a museum, there is a general agreement it “must be” art.
Tongue in cheek, we sold most of our pieces through an art gallery (Galleria Osemont, Albissola Mare, Savona Italy).
But ultimately you are the judge. We truly feel the greatest accomplishment is to give pleasure to our visitors. So we hope you enjoy what you see, as that gives more meaning to our work.
1)(Cappelieri, Alba: Jewelry now. Art, fashion, design. Electa (Mondadori S.p.A. Milano) 2010.) pg.99
2) Ibid. pg. 184
