mint museum

on sunday i went to the mint museum of craft and design in charlotte, nc to see ornament as art: avant-garde jewelry from the helen williams drutt collection. as a whole the exhibition is pretty incredible. it includes some 275 pieces by jewelry artists from around the world from the 60s-90s. these pieces are important for many reasons namely due to the ground breaking nature of the work. jewelry like this had not been seen before and has paved the way for studio jewelry today. i have to say, though, much of it looks dated and many pieces appeared dingy and dull. however, despite that, the collection remains impressive.

my absolute favorite piece was a square necklace by tone vigeland made of hundreds of sterling silver squares with a square neck opening. the squares measure maybe 1/2" and form a grid. i can't find an image of it now to share, unfortunately. i also loved seeing pieces by manfred bischoff like the brooch above. other highlights include work by fukuchi kyoko, annelies planteijdt, and janna syvanoja.

i also checked out the mint's fantastic contemporary jewelry collection which includes work by vera siemund, melanie bilenker, tracy steepy, and my studiomate geoff giles.

thanks for reading.