Wednesday, March 10, 2010

this feeling

Recently, I've been fascinated with jewelry and accessories that use live or formerly alive materials. Static, tragic, beautiful, frozen in time, given new life.
What I find most interesting is the abstract use of animal parts in a way that still remains organic. Typically, I would recoil at the use of pig intenstines in a necklace or birds as brooches, but this time I'm very intrigued.

Catarina Hallzon necklace made from pig intestines and silver


Julia deVille brooch made from a sparrow, silver and gold


I'm starting to think my brain is evolving into this sick little thing since I don't even eat land animals, yet I find myself drooling over jewelry made from horse teeth. But, and a big but, I do use leather bags, wool sweaters and cashmere cardigans. Hm, hypocrite, much?

Warwick Freeman brooches made from horse teeth

Sebastian Buescher is one artist that I was continually drawn back to. Each of his pieces need closer and frequent inspection. He uses a variety of mediums, mainly aquatic creatures and elements of nature, that give his jewelry a clustered look; brimming with life and ideas. As I was going through his search results, I found his personal blog and another called Walking the Gray Area. Reading through his blog was a pick me up in the middle of the day because it's filled with positive reflections and quotes. The latter posts the dialouge of 23 pairs of studio jewelry artists, which Sebastian is one of, along with a few of my other favorites like Terhi Tolvanen and Jorge Manilla. Walking the Gray Area let's you know what these artists are experiencing, thinking and feeling, and how all those factors are then channeled into their jewelry.

Here are some images of Sebastian's Hadal Realm collection:

The Balance (wood, starfish, crystal, urchin spines, silver)


Encrustathon (granulex, rubber, crystals, urchin spines)


Mountain Range (stingray skin, moonstone, epoxy, metal)


Encrusterium 8 (unknown materials)


White Death (ceramic, shark jaw, epoxy putty, metal)

"The Hadal Realm, also known as the Hadal Zone, is the deepest part of the ocean. I am comparing this place with the human subconscious mind and find that the two have far more in common than you may suspect. It is the vastness in both that fascinates me, along with the quantity of stuff that is collected and stored in its 'darkness'. Everything we see, smell, hear, do, think, and whatever else we encounter through any of our senses, is stored in our subconscious mind. It is all there, perfectly in tact." - Sebastian Buescher

5 comments:

denise - SUPERWOWOMG said...

at first i thought the first necklace was absolutely amazzzzzzing but the second I read that it was made from pig intestines, i immediately cringed and got goosebumps. I'm majorly majorly majorly against killing pigs so this kinda...crushed me ): i dunno ahahaha

Allie said...

So if I send you my wisdom teeth... ;)

P R I M O E Z A said...

julia de ville is really well known here, but i hadn't seen any of the others - fascinating.

Mathilde said...

I don't think I could actually wear a necklace made of pigs intestines but I do think it's spectacularly beautiful. And I'm the same - a long time vegetarian who wears leather. Sometimes I struggle with it but mostly I think my choice doesn't disagree with eating meat or fish it's just the methods of production and the environmental impact they have. If those things were different I would love to eat them.

Although I know that say the production of fur is hideous I can't quite view it in the same way because I'm not physically ingesting the pain. There's the struggle - because that probably does make me a hypocrite in some way.

Amanda said...

love when something beautiful is created out of something not generally beautiful...