A Sense of Jewellery brought together outstanding examples of modern jewellery by forty artists and designers made in Britain over the past forty years. Opening at the Goldsmiths’ Centre in Clerkenwell, London, as part of the London Design Festival, the exhibition sets out to rediscover British jewellery design and celebrates the quality of design thinking and material innovation which has emerged from independent studios in this period.
Jewels are one of the most intimate and oldest forms of human expression, seen in the extraordinary objects held in museums and personal collections worldwide. This exhibition united pieces from the V&A, the Crafts Council, private patrons, artist collections and The Goldsmiths’ Company’s own collection to demonstrate how artists and designers continue to be drawn to this field of activity, inspired by its human and material histories.
This unique combination of British works was curated by invited guest curators: Amanda Game, a leading UK independent curator and producer in the field of jewellery and silversmithing and Liveryman of The Goldsmiths’ Company and Professor Dorothy Hogg MBE, influential designer and former Head of the Jewellery in Edinburgh College of Art. Major works by established artists such as Wendy Ramshaw CBE and Gerda Flockinger CBE will be shown alongside works by emerging makers from across the UK, such as Andrew Lamb and Zoe Arnold.
As the curators explain: ‘the new Goldsmiths’ Centre is a groundbreaking investment in imagination and practical skills for the next generation of jewellers, based on the principles of creativity, craftsmanship and community. A Sense of Jewellery will explore these principles through some wonderful objects which at the time of making shifted perception of how jewellery can be both made, enjoyed and worn.’
Over the past forty years, the UK has fostered a high level of creative practice, with international connections, through a unique combination of vibrant art colleges, focused patronage and active museum collecting and exhibitions. The Goldsmith Company, one of London’s oldest Livery Companies, has supported jewellery making in Britain of which the Goldsmiths’ Centre, a charity for the professional training of goldsmiths, is a new chapter. These are the contexts for A Sense of Jewellery.