My first ever experience at Collect was an amazing one. The exhibition literally 'collects' galleries, artists and designers who are active in the craft world... so that's objects like jewellery, ceramics, glass wear, vessels, silver wear and so on.
I went with exhibiting jeweller, David Poston. Exhibiting with the Scottish gallery, he first took me there to show me his own work, which was amazing! I'll have to send him an email to ask if I'm allowed to display any of the images of me trying his jewellery on. I'll do my best to describe it anyway...
David Poston's jewellery is an amazing combination of fantastic skill with metal and textile. He has made several pieces which are so weightless, and have a fantastic shape to them, rather similar to DNA in the way that they have a sort of double helix, combined with threads woven in and out of metal bars to form a tapestry like effect, each edge making an entirely different shape to another. His work is inspiring as I think that it bridges the gap between work that I love as a sculptural piece, and jewellery that I would wear.
This gap is rarely filled, even by me and I will wear whatever I enjoy looking at, and not a lot of the things at collect did as David's work did. I found that work exhibited by any gallery from the Netherlands was absolutely mental and fantastically fun, but not at all wearable, for example the work of Noon Passama, is completely brilliant... but I wouldn't wear it to town.
On the contrary, I came across Helen Britton, exhibiting with gallery Louise Smit, who displayed work like this. Is it not brilliant, fun and wearable, mixed up with a dash of dangerous, which is what I strive to create!
As well as discovery my own boundaries, I learnt quite a lot about the world of design, and how it is becoming increasingly computer assisted, such as this work by Michael Eden.
I think that learning this has made me quite sad, knowing now that when I go to university I will be learning to use computer programmes that design and make my work almost entirely for me. For me this would take the blood, sweat and tears out of my career, and to me this is what I fear.
Nasty colour too...
However, its not all bad news! There are still places like Bishopsland Educational Trust that provide students with practical hands on experience, focusing just on the make and do!
This post has been simply reflective as most of my visit will be documented via 1 billion business cards that I picked up on my travels! And I'll ask if I can upload some images of at least me in David's jewellery!
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