CURRENT OBSESSION PAPER FOR MUNICH JEWELLERY WEEK 2021

EXCERPT:

“Mirrored reflections, like the digital matrices we increasingly reside in, use a self-reflexive technology of absolute feedback. These visual and psycho-social echo-chambers refract a composited view of ‘self’ back to us. Driven by deep-learning algorithms and reflective surfaces alike, these spaces allow us to observe ourselves in the manner in which we typically observe others. In Rosalind Krauss’s essay The Aesthetics of Narcissism, she writes of the mirror-reflection as an apparatus of “self-encapsulation – the body or psyche as its own surround.”

The encapsulation of ‘self’ in these reverberant spaces is profound, particularly in the midst of a plague year which has necessitated ‘filter bubbles’ of self-containment and mounting reliance on the digital grid for connection and self-recognition. From the convex mirrors of vanitas paintings to the eternally scrolling ‘For You’ pages of social media platforms, reflection is a historical through-line of the human need to visualize ‘self’ – no matter how distorted or fractured the reflection may be.

Situated within this reflective echo-chamber is Hard Copy, an exhibition of seven cerebral contemporary jewelers whose work engages with conceptual projects of self-reflexivity: from works that embody their own 3-D printed conception, like Ellen Sisti’s Detritus Bangle II, to works of tactile resistance, in which brooches become blind tigers for touch and play, like Sarah Montagnoli’s Red Velvet. 

The objects in Hard Copy each occupy a mirrored chamber whose warped reflections imitate their aesthetic strategies. Works about accumulation are multiplied and expanded by their reflections, while works that interrogate their own digital nature gaze into the reflective matrix introspectively. Each piece becomes encapsulated within its own surround. The kaleidoscopic, refractive quality of the display is further embodied by the exhibition’s images, which are composites of photographs and digital renderings by the artists.

Yuye Zhang’s Infinity 002 is a buildable brooch that can be reconfigured indefinitely, composed of interlocking, digitally-modeled units and adherent electrode backings. Similarly focused on accumulation, James Betts’ undulating Manifestation of Growth II brooch is built from the accretion of metal particles in electroforming. The work takes on the abstracted, organic form of a Rorschach inkblot and beckons the viewer to visually decipher it.

Ellen Sisti’s works are iteratively built from the detritus of her 3D printing process. Vestigial supports that are typically cast off become central to her forms – cast in silver, scanned, and re-modeled. Similarly, Wensi Huang appropriates the visual language of digital modeling, framing her delicate interior forms with silver scaffolding that represents emotional support.

Casey Newberg’s Deflated brooch series sandwiches emoji condolence balloons between acrylic and handwrought metal backings, forever preserving a moment of eager comfort with the deflation of bad news. Sharon Stampfer’s The Feelings in My Throat, similarly preserves a gesture of care and compression by electroforming the cast of a hand pressing against the throat to soothe constriction. Responding to a pandemic that renders intimacy illicit, Sarah Montagnoli’s brooch Red Velvet invites play. Like a tactile speakeasy that enacts restriction and access, interior swells of velvet protrude from the perforations in its metal containment.”