AJF Blog

Jose Marín  is a master jeweler from Valencia, Spain, who is having a one- person show at Mobilia Gallery in Cambridge, Massachusetts. His exhibit is up until June 22, 2013, and so we tried to slip in this interview before it came down.

Susan Cummins: Can you tell me the story of how you discovered that you wanted to be a jeweler?

Jose Marín: My father was a goldsmith. In my childhood, at 10 or 12 years old, I used to play in his workshop, which was in our house. That is how he woke up my love for this craft.

Where did you learn to make jewelry?

Jose Marín: At 13 years old, after school and in the early evenings, I went to a jewelry school at the Jewelers Guild in Valencia, Spain. Here, I studied jewelry making for five years, and after that, then four years of engravings and setting.

I have had 3 teachers. My father, until his death in 2006, taught me the jewelry style of Valencia, which is a jewel of floral inspiration and very baroque. It is made with platinum and gold leaves with a very traditional technique unique to this geographical area in Spain. I also learned the art of forging solid gold from him.

Pascua Auñon l was my first boss from 1981 to 1986. He had worked for 15 years in Germany. He taught me to do rivière necklaces and bracelets and all kinds of jewelry made with wire. more...

Vander A Gallery in Brussels, Belgium, has put forth a great effort to showcase student and teacher work from Belgium. Their show Tweex 1 hopes to promote contemporary jewelry at a time when there is a perception that Belgium is losing ground as a good location for learning. The older makers and even their students are bowing out, and there isn’t a school in Belgium that offers a complete jewelry program. It seems that it is a critical time for learning the craft. I like the way Françoise Vanderauwera, the owner of the gallery, talked about the “transfer of knowledge” as what happens between student and teacher. It has a Buddhist ring to it. This young gallery has a fascinating program, which is apparent in the recent interview with Françoise by Kellie Riggs for the “Dealer Profiles” section on the AJF website.

Susan Cummins: Françoise, please explain the TWEEX project and the reasons why you initiated it.

Françoise Vanderauwera: TWEEX is a project about the transfer of knowledge in Belgian contemporary art jewelry. This kind of transfer for this young artistic discipline has always existed in Belgium. But due to political and community reasons, it has not been widely promoted, and there are other reasons as well. This project shows the excellent work of our masters and their students spanning more than two generations. It aims, thanks to a complete and clear analysis, to fill the gap and to ensure our legitimate place on the international scene. This project also attempts to understand Belgian contemporary art jewelry better, where it comes from and where it goes. more...

ATTA Gallery in Bangkok, Thailand, is run by Atty Tantivit and shows an international selection of jewelers with local ones. It makes for an interesting mix worth looking in on from time to time. The exhibition Hardware Artware highlights five jewelers who have been showing together for a few years and who are experimenting with presentations. They have an interesting history.

Susan Cummins: Why did you choose these particular five artists–Francisca Bauzá (Germany), Lisa Björke (Sweden), Märta Mattsson (Sweden), Deborah Rudolph (Germany), and Nina Sajet (The Netherlands)—to be in this show?

Atty Tantivit: Though I have seen some of their works before separately, I first saw them working as a group at the exhibition Pin Up during Schmuck 2012. Their pieces are different in many ways but are of equal strength in terms of concept, technical quality, and their communicative languages. There was a synergy among them. I think the way they present their works together is fresh and exciting—a group of young female artists in a field that was dominated by men a decade or so ago. Also, all five of them are from northern European countries that are key players in terms of contemporary art jewelry. It was interesting for me to see similarities and differences in their works. more...

Recently, Kobi Bosshard was honored as part of an ongoing series at New Zealand’s Object Space called “Master of Craft.” It celebrates the achievements of outstanding New Zealand practitioners working at the highest level. The show and catalogue are the work of AJF’s former editor Damian Skinner. In the mid-twentieth century, Kobi brought his jewelry skills to New Zealand and provided a link from the old world to the new. In this show at The National in Christchurch, he is looking back at his heritage and to his grandfather Jacob Bosshard for new ideas.

Susan Cummins: You are the third generation in a line of Swiss goldsmiths. Why does this seem important for you to explore in this exhibition?

Kobi Bosshard: I like to remind myself, and others, that the world did not begin with me. That our forebears, for example my grandfather and my father, were highly skilled goldsmiths, and that I am at the very present edge of a very long tradition. more...

Aaron Faber Gallery in New York City is presenting the work of five master jewelers from Europe and America. In an impressive showing of innovative stonecutters and metalworkers, this exhibit celebrates the creative talents of these jewelers. Patricia Faber answers some questions about the choice of jewelers and what is so special about their work.

Susan Cummins: The title of your show is Dramatic Jewelry. How would you define dramatic jewelry as opposed to any other kind?

Patricia Faber: The title of this show cannot be parsed. It is Dramatic Jewelry: The Five Masters. Usually, gallery show titles are headlines or banners to communicate the essence of the exhibition and to describe it to non-collectors as well as to the jewelry community. So the word “jewelry” in the title is essential. And in the presence of these works, their dramatic scale stands out. These are all artists exploring the sculptural possibilities of their media, and the works are large. more...

The Swiss jeweler David Bielander is unique and so is his jewelry. In his current show at Gallery S O, he presents a broad array of his work, going back to the famous 1999 lips. There is always something intriguing, strange, and humorous about his jewelry, and the more you ponder it the more amazing it becomes. He has his own ways of thinking about what he does as well. It is all very curious and fascinating. How does he think of these things?

Recently, David Bielander was chosen by the AJF board to make the 2014 AJF membership pin. I can hardly wait to see what he does.

Susan Cummins: David, can you tell the story of how you discovered you wanted to make jewelry?

David Bielander: My first encounter with the world of making jewelry happened when I was 19 and had to make an unscheduled detour on my straight-lined and not at all naive path to become a groundbreaking fashion designer in Antwerp. A trial week in goldsmithing, followed by a four year apprenticeship as a traditional goldsmith. I did this because of the attraction of the resistance of metal and the handling of fire. But mainly because I was fascinated that everything I learnt was visible on the bench at the end of the day and also everything that I had thought I had learnt, but in fact had not internalized was also visible.

I did this not because I would have been interested in jewelry in any way. I have never been a dedicated wearer, I could not comprehend the notions of enhancing a person, of simple beautification, joyful decoration, or showing off materialized technical virtuosity or splendor, which I learnt would be the parameters of jewelry. Even not after having been the goldsmith for two years of the wonderfully kooky Georg Spreng.

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Alexander Blank studied jewelry from 1997 to 2010 at a variety of different schools and finished as a graduate of Munich’s Academy of Fine Arts where he was a student of Otto Künzli’s. In a recent AJF blog, Blank answered questions about his experience of studying with Künzli, but this interview is about his first solo show in the United States. Ornamentum, a gallery located in Hudson, New York, invited Blank to present a retrospective of his work from 2006 to the present. It is an opportunity to see the development of his thinking and understand the recurring themes told through his passionate interest in storytelling. Blank is clearly a smart and talented maker with a youthful zest for life.

Susan Cummins: Alexander, you recently answered some questions for this blog about working with Otto Künzli at the Academy of Fine Arts in Munich, so I won’t ask you about your academic training, but can you tell us the story of how you became interested in being a jeweler?

Alexander Blank: Actually, I was not very interested in nor was I planning to become a jeweler when I started it. I wanted to become a photographer, but the one I chose to study with already had an apprentice, so I just simply inquired in the next shop down which happened to be a goldsmith. They took me as an apprentice, but I really was more interested in my friends, sports, and just hanging out at the time. I have to say that I was still quite immature.

Jewelry became much more interesting to me when I was in the advanced technical college in Hanau, Germany. There, I began to get an idea of what jewelry could be beyond well-crafted pieces, good selling ideas, and old school tradition. I felt there was more potential and other values beyond the material based intentions in the jewelry making. Suddenly I noticed that it was possible approach a jewelry piece to criticize, comment, use, and narrate everything I can imagine. That made me very curious, and I continued to study in Munich. To make it short, not much has changed from the younger version of me, but now I feel like jewelry has turned into my playground, and I have begun to love that game. more...

With Otto Künzli’s much-deserved exhibition up at the Pinakothek der Moderne in Munich, Germany, it seems to be a good time to have a deeper look at his work as a professor as well as a maker. Five of his students—Alexander Blank, Attai Chen, Carina Chitsaz-Shoshtary, Melanie Isverding, and Mia Maljojoki have organized a show at the Galerie Rosemarie Jäger this month called Helter Skelter. Rather than discussing the theme of the show, I decided to ask these former students of Otto Künzli’s about his work as a teacher.

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Klimt02 Gallery, in Barcelona, Spain, is having an exhibition this month with Mari Ishikawa. Mari is Japanese but trained at the Academy of Fine Arts in Munich and now lives there. She was a Herbert Hofmann awardee in 2000 and the Elizabeth R. Raphael Founder Prize winner last year. Mari has shown far and wide and brings her special point of view to the jewelry she makes. Her show Landscape became an opportunity for an interview this month.

Susan Cummins: Can you tell me the story of how you discovered that you wanted to be a jeweler?

Mari Ishikawa: I worked as an interior designer in Japan. It was quite interesting, but the range was too limited. Jewelry gives me more artistic freedom. At the same time, the relationship that exists between the object, the person who wears it, and me is more personal and more intense in jewelry. more...

Gravers Lane Gallery in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, is showing the work of Montana-born jeweler Ken Bova. Ken is currently a professor at the very active East Carolina University in Greenville, North Carolina. This exhibition gave me a chance to find out a bit more about Ken and his work as a jeweler, an enamellist, and unexpectedly as it turns out, a reader.

Susan Cummins: Ken, can you tell me the story of how you became a jeweler?

Ken Bova: Interestingly (at least to me anyway) while in high school I bought a set of jewelry tools (pliers, a saw frame and a few hammers). I tried to teach myself how to make silver rings and bangle bracelets (without much success I might add) but abandoned it after entering college to study art.  The stage was set before university, but I just needed the right nudge and opportunity.

I was working on my BFA with a major in painting and drawing when a professor hired me to help hang wallboard in a studio he was building. Part of this studio was dedicated to a small jewelry making space. In exchange for the help,

I was paid in part with six weeks of jewelry casting lessons. I was hooked. I was only a semester away from getting my degree when I decided that this was it—THE discipline I wanted to pursue as an artist. Because the school had no program in metals, I finished the degree in painting and then transferred to the University of Houston. I studied for a year of post-baccalaureate work with Val Link and Sandie Zilker before applying to graduate schools. 

I was convinced I wanted to be a smith and concentrated on raising and forming processes. In graduate school, however, I found myself inexplicably drawn to the wearable—perhaps because of its intimate scale or maybe because working with the brooch format was comfortable and echoed my experience in painting. In any case, I gravitated towards jewelry, and there I’ve stayed.

By the way, I still have the very first piece of jewelry I cast, a sterling silver and tumbled jade stone ring. more...