Calendar: May 2015

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post last updated: 12th May

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3D printing and the future of jewellery

A little while ago (August last year), after seeing Bin Dixon-Ward’s ‘Grids‘ exhibition at Craft, I wrote the following about three-dimensional printing:
“I am interested in how this technology will impact future creation of adornment – perhaps even self-service jewellery, where a ‘designer’ makes their original design available online and a person can purchase it to have it printed themselves in whatever colour and material they desire.”

With a little more knowledge, I’d amend that to “whatever colour they wished, or cast in the material they desire“.

My recent visit to Maureen Faye-Chauhan’s ‘Concurrence‘ exhibition at Gallery Funaki woke this question up again … as my favourite pieces in the show, the gold rings, were 3D-printed and then cast (available in limited editions).

If memory serves (and that’s quite a significant caveat lately), I think the first time I saw jewellery made with the assistance of this technology were Cinnamon Lee‘s rings … though I’m sure she was working on them for years before I set my eyes on them at the 2009 BUDA award exhibition.

As affordability, level of detail, accessibility to printers and usability of software improves, I’m sure we’ll see much more of this technology in the world of jewellery … not least because it permits expanded creativity for makers, but it also can make pieces more affordable for wearers (as it reduces manufacturing time for complex pieces).

I don’t think it’ll be very long before we see a kind of self-service or click-and-order situation …

What do you think?

Poetry

I found this recently and utterly fell in love.
I think I shall seek out more of this poet’s work.

“You will hear thunder and remember me,
And think: she wanted storms. The rim
Of the sky will be the colour of hard crimson,
And your heart, as it was then, will be on fire.”

Anna Akhmatova
(literary pseudonym of Anna Andreevna Gorenko)
(translated from original Russian)

Melissa Cameron ‘Object Evolution’ @ Bini Gallery

What a few days I’ve had of jewellery viewing and gallery visiting – it’s been quite lovely and a timely reminder of how enjoyable I find it.

Melissa Cameron, once Melbourne-based and now in Seattle, is showing a mini-retrospective (if I may!) at Bini Gallery: ‘Object Evolution: Jewellery from objects 2009-2015‘.

photograph with gallery permission

Exhibition media: ““The rebirthed jewels on show in her upcoming solo exhibition at Bini Gallery span the last six years of her artistic output. Included in the display will be the original half-cigarette-tin pair of brooches that launched her investigation, alongside new pieces finished this year. This is the first time that Melissa has had a solo show of just her object works, which begs the question, what has taken so long? “These pieces come out of my studio kind of sporadically, they are often made for specific exhibitions, so it’s only recently that I have managed to get a bunch of them back together to put a good-sized group of them on display.” Melissa adds, “It seemed like a good opportunity to bring them home while I still had all of them together.”“

photograph taken with gallery permission

It’s funny, just last week I published a ‘Other April’ post that included a link to my post of Melissa’s first exhibition (well, her Honours exhibition at Monash), with the image of my favourite piece from that show. Well, it’s been altered from an object to a neckpiece (above) and is in this show.

Still a favourite of mine. And how beautiful are the shadows it casts…

photograph with gallery permission

It was interesting speaking with the gallery owner, who mentioned her initial attraction to Melissa’s work was to the geometry … she mentioned she was a maths teacher, so we had a little mathematician bonding moment, bless.

Absolutely worth a visit!

‘Object Evolution: Jewellery from objects 2009-2015‘ is at Bini Gallery (Collingwood) until 30th April 2015.

photograph taken with gallery permission