Wax Odyssey

I once asked a colleague to cast some small plastic soldiers for me. The soldiers came out brilliantly, but equally fascinating was the elaborate network of sprues he had constructed to make sure the molten silver fed into every little nook and cranny of the mould. Once removed, the waste sprue sat on my desk for over a year. Eventually I decided to experiment with wax wire as a means of generating form in itself, aiming towards a series of ‘fantasy sprues’. The series of models remains unfinished (I made over 50 models, of which only one was eventually cast in silver; see image 43) but they paved the way for a collection of future pieces entitled Fantasy Sprues and Patterns of Unnecessary Complexity.
Meanwhile, a pile of wax off-cuts accumulated on my bench. Just as the first sprue had been a by-product of the production of another object, I realised that my equivalent lay in the scrap wax and not in the structures I was trying to make. The scrap wax was therefore cast as a series of clusters, by picking up small handfuls and fabricating whatever structure they happened to form. The colleague who produced the initial sprue is an extremely skilled and respected jeweller in his own right, and he has no idea about any of this.

http://www.laurapotter.co.uk

http://www.sharipierce.com

http://yokoshimizu.alchimia.it/

http://blandine-luce.com

Each day a multitude of information is exchanged between the self, individuals and society.
‘We’ interact on multiple levels with other beings.
Aknowlegded or unperceptible , it is however essential to the existence of our beings.

http://www.arnaud-sprimont.be/

http://www.aoikotsuhiroi.com

www.spo-creations.com

Artist Statement
The jewellery and wall pieces I have designed are an interpretative response to contemporary architecture. I am interested in identifying a particular viewpoint of a building and subsequently produce graphic drawings illustrating its inner and outer structural lines.
These 2-dimensional diagrams provide templates from which I produce 3-dimensional forms.  I am interested in testing the spatial boundary between the 2D and 3D, manipulating sheet into planar objects whilst never becoming fully volumetric.
Each piece relies on another for its outer silhouette as one sheet of metal produces at least three structures.  Positive space informs negative and vice versa.

http://niamhspain.com/

Abstraction and Geometry
by Cecilia Richard

From my beginnings in the field of jewelry, and as a fact of life, I was interested in inquiring and
exploring the configurations in space, “the three-dimensional”.
The first stage was characterized by works which focused on the forms that can be found in nature,
related to its organic form and structure, with greater profusion of elements. These designs or
configurations, despite my particular intervention, were typical of the craft media, from where
I took the first elements of jewelry. Likewise, the structuring in planes could already be seen in these pieces:
pendular elements that delimited the containing space and that also, by their movement,
gave certain dynamics to the piece.
Gradually, concerns about the relationship between space and matter started to put aside the
iconic component in order to start focusing on a more pure language that allowed these kinds of researches.
Thus, there came a gradual passage towards abstraction, and particularly, to the geometrization of forms.

Being my way of working and reasoning “think while I do”, with an idea in mind,
the resolution of each piece is forged in the environment of my workshop in direct dialogue
with the materials and their capabilities, using or not a sketch; and if it becomes necessary to use one,
it is usually with the objective of clarifying some aspect relating to the ‘engineering’ of the piece.
I can say that I have never been interested in the design itself nor in the technique itself.
Since I recognize the vital importance of the world of ideas, I think the work, as well as oneself,
are forged, tempered and transformed in direct dialogue with the matter. It is in the action of penetration of
the idea in the matter, at its pulse for combining these two levels of different nature that I can experience a
form of re-creating myself with each work.

I recognize two different possibilities when it comes the moment of facing a jewelry work.
The first one implies an almost total independence of the potential of use, where the idea
of the usable jewel is almost an excuse to develop a concept based on an object of small scale.
On the other hand, considering the human body and its topography, I try to establish a dialogue with it,
empowering lines, curves, empty spaces, volumes, articulations and the possibility of movement in
so much as the user is a “living entity”. But particularly, it should be understood that above the character
of each piece of jewelry, the potential semantic conjunction that it is established with the character proper
to the person who wears it will always be present.

The choice of a geometric language determines a way of structuring the idea, the absence of narrative,
the essentiality of the form, and a more ascetic type of configuration. It could be stated that these pieces
make use of a language with certain architectural traits.
Once the idea of fragmentation of random appearance is materialized, it could be said that the pieces
are characterized by a reference or allusion to both the ordering of certain patterns in nature
(mineral, vegetable, etc.) and the artifices of an urban culture.
Ideas of totality and fragmentation; fragments that converge in unity and unity that can be broken
down into parts. Geometry that folds and unfolds; complexity and simplicity in the same object.
Gentle planes culminating in sharp edges or steep angles. Repetition of the same regular element or
irregularity that does not repeat or seek to prevail.

A Specific Feature, common to all these works, is the possibility of intrinsic motion and transformation
specific of each piece; each object completes its orbit of significance at the time it is used, manipulated
(not just in the traditional way, that is to say “using it”, but allowing the possibility of grabbing, handling,
modifying the piece through the “ludic” and reflexive intervention of the person using it).

Each piece has a range of metamorphic possibilities, activated by the user interaction with the object,
opening a chapter in the temporal / spatial aspect of the perception of the work. That action produces
a process and a dynamics of change, which may trigger a number of associations or
thoughts on the part of the subject.

I recognize in my work and in its evolutionary process a development ranging from considering a
focal point where the interest converges on the object, to incorporating all parts of the piece as formal
elements of equal value. The object so conceived grows and absorbs even the parts that were previously
exclusively functional to support or ergonomics.
The object has gained value as a whole and as a unit, and thus has gained autonomy as such. Even so,
and in spite of that, it can still be a piece of jewelry and at the same time have the potential to establishing
other relationships with their users.
I think this movement and this passage, evidenced in the development of my work, correspond to an
experimental attitude that as it expands the boundaries of jewelry, approaches and reinforces in the field of art.
That is why I can reaffirm the idea that, to this day, my search within the sphere of contemporary jewelry has
been related to finding in the object-jewel a territory that contemplates the world of ideas, allows a space for
poetics and finds in its “use” a place suitable for the significance.-

Text published by Arch. Cayetana Mercé, Summa+ #68 architecture and desing magazine, pp. 124/127,
Buenos Aires, Argentina, 2004.

http://ceciliarichard.com.ar/

www.maluberbers.nl

I am fascinated by how things work and how they are made.
My design process often involves the appropriation of basic building
forms from history – pyramids, domes – interpreted on a smaller, more personal scale.
I have a continuing fascination with micro organisms, tessellations, geodesic domes,
space travel and the aesthetics of futuristic architecture. I explore these apparently
incongruent elements and interests in my work , finding ways to reconcile and
marry the aesthetic worlds of the organic and the industrial.

www.emmajanedonald.com