Low-Tech Jewelry for Inspiration
by Violet Ita
As we are all stuck at home, we thought it would be fitting to highlight some low-tech jewelry as inspiration. The artists we are featuring use every day and/or accessible materials as well as processes that do not require highly specialized tools.
Primarily known as a modern fiber artist, Anni Albers created a series of jewelry in 1940 with common household items. These pieces can be looked at in the context of the Bauhaus art movement Albers was a part of, which favored functional design over embellishment. These pieces have broken down jewelry to its most basic function of adornment. Using common objects in the pieces removes the value normally associated with precious materials in jewelry and allows the pieces to exist solely as ornamentation.
Nora Fok, a contemporary jeweler, uses all hand techniques to make her beautiful, ethereal weavings, without any mechanical tools. Working intuitively, she translates natural forms into intricate jewelry through different fiber techniques with clear and pigmented monofilament. The resulting pieces play with scale and repetition of organic imagery. The pieces also challenge the expected scale and size of wearable jewelry.
Playing with the idea of recycling materials, as well as injecting fun into her work, contemporary jeweler Tabitha Ott creates playful and colorful jewelry through repurposed materials. The resulting pieces made of colorful, layered plastic create a whimsical interaction between the wearer and the jewelry. The plastic adds to the humor of these pieces, particularly because Ott often uses recognizable symbols and objects in her pieces, allowing the viewer to understand the origin of the components.
The last artist we have included is contemporary jeweler Lisa Walker, whose use of a vast range of materials and techniques makes her work incredibly relevant to materials we see in our modern world. Recycled and transformed nails, human hair, and clothing make up her work are used to construct pieces that draw inspiration from across jewelry history and culture. Her pieces investigate what jewelry is and can be. They ask what is valuable about jewelry. Is it the materials, or the pieces themselves?
We hope you may pull inspiration and motivation for pieces of your own from home!
