- Nelson Jewelry Week (NJW) goals to offer a platform that encourages collaborative long-term relationships between native and nationwide jewelers, and future alternatives inside each the Whakatū (Nelson) and nationwide arts and design communities
- The occasion was first held in Nelson, Aotearoa New Zealand, in March/April 2021
- It has no particular theme
Vicki Mason: How did Nelson Jewelry Week come into being?
Kay van Dyk and Katie Pascoe: Kay, who’s on the board of trustees at Arts Council Nelson (ACN), was a part of a dialogue whereas planning exhibitions for the council’s Refinery ArtSpace gallery. The Handshake Mission (Peter Deckers and Hilda Gasgard, Wellington, NZ) was programmed to point out work as a part of their important 10-year anniversary exhibition. It was recommended that we situate a jewellery occasion round this exhibition to provide it a wider context, and to rejoice modern artwork jewellery making in Aotearoa. The ten-day occasion included a number of exhibitions, public talks, workshops, and social occasions.
Vicki Mason: Inform us about Nelson and the position modern jewellery performs there.
Kay van Dyk and Katie Pascoe: Traditionally Nelson was a middle of effective gold and silversmithing by way of Jens Hansen, a Danish jeweller who emigrated to New Zealand in 1952, and to Nelson in 1968. Scandinavian design was new to NZ and to Nelson. Many well-known New Zealand jewelers went by way of the workshop, together with Ray Mitchell, Gavin Hitchings, Kim Brice, and Warwick Freeman.
A small variety of artwork jewellery makers at present dwell in Nelson. They’ve come by way of Nelson Marlborough Institute of Expertise Bachelor of Arts and Media, and thru Whitireia (Wellington) Bachelor of Visible Arts (Jewelry). Two public galleries assist and exhibit modern artwork jewellery: Te Aratoi of Whakatū The Suter, and Refinery ArtSpace.
There may be, in fact, a powerful custom of Ngā Toi (Maōri arts and crafts) with modern makers working inside the subject. Neither Katie nor myself really feel certified to talk particularly to this, however it’s a topic a lot written about by folks akin to Damian Skinner. Argillite/pakohe stone is discovered domestically. It was (and is) used for taonga (a treasured possession, extremely prized) akin to jewellery and instruments.
Vicki Mason: What standards did you utilize to pick out the occasions, workshops, talks, and exhibitions that made up this system?
Kay van Dyk and Katie Pascoe: The decision went out to makers on our database, with a small variety of makers personally requested to submit a proposal. NZ being small, phrase of mouth additionally works very effectively. Exhibitions had been chosen for his or her decision of ideas and innovation, and matched to galleries/venues/home windows. With 16/28 exhibitions being group reveals (two to eight jewelers) and over 100 makers, discovering venues was difficult, however we managed to pick out an amazing vary of comparatively new to mid-career and skilled makers. Potential workshop tutors had been approached for his or her curiosity in instructing, so we might embody workshops for a spread of introductory, mid-career, and past makers.
Vicki Mason: Now that you simply’ve had time to course of, share your reflections with us.
Kay van Dyk and Katie Pascoe: We’d like our foremost public gallery, Te Aratoi of Whakatū The Suter, to remain on board and embody curated exhibitions to coincide with NJW 2025. We’d like to incorporate a retrospective exhibition of a well known Aotearoa maker, to be determined. With curiosity rising within the occasion we envisage many extra EOI for 2025 so we might want to think about extra strong necessities and choice processes.
Kay van Dyk: I knew concerning the generosity of the jewellery group, however it turned extra obvious simply how evident and powerful that is. Jewellery persons are up for having enjoyable. Creating a possibility for them to satisfy up and be collectively makes me blissful, it’s value all of the onerous work.
Katie Pascoe: I 100% agree with Kay on this! The jewelers and the makers are on the coronary heart of this pageant and all the pieces radiates out from there. The goodwill they dropped at NJW makes all of it worthwhile.
The urge for food for studying alternatives is large, notably with the lack of jewellery levels and masters’ applications in New Zealand. Technical and conceptual workshops will proceed to be a big a part of our ethos and we’ll work with smaller workshops to offer these the place potential. Suggestions from the yr is to incorporate extra workshops for mid-career to skilled makers, notably technical workshops from esteemed jewelers. We’re discussing making the pageant seven days and bringing different folks on board throughout the occasion to assist the “roll out.”
Kay van Dyk: [Prior to the event], the considered going out 10 nights in a row was horrible, however it turned out to be nice!
Vicki Mason: What had been some sudden outcomes?
Kay van Dyk: I used to be shocked that individuals got here to NJW from Australia, each makers and their companions as a part of the Licky present. Licky, a gaggle present by lesbian artists, is the primary of its type that’s identified inside New Zealand and Australia.
Katie Pascoe: I’m an enormous believer in artwork being a generative expertise for all. Operating the pageant actually purchased house the true energy of artwork and craft to foster connection and construct a joyful group.
Listening to the quantity of suggestions from individuals who occurred upon work in home windows and Buildings Want Jewelry, and the life they mentioned it dropped at city and the group. The chance to expertise artwork in on a regular basis conditions excites us as makers and venture managers.
Vicki Mason: Nelson is faraway from big-city hustle and bustle. How did this have an effect on this system/tone of your week?
Kay van Dyk and Katie Pascoe: The scale of Nelson has benefits. All of the exhibitions and venues had been walkable between one another and from lodging. There’s no want for automotive rental and the airport is a 10-minute drive away and there are an amazing vary of lodging decisions in Nelson.
Nelson is a wonderful and small place. The city gives simple strolling distance to most facilities and is near the ocean, rivers and mountains. The views are spectacular! And I’d argue it has one of the best metropolis seashore—Tahunanui—in Aotearoa NZ. There’s a historical past of appreciating and supporting the humanities and crafts inside the area, with many glorious carvers, potters, and jewelers being a part of its historical past. It’s additionally the birthplace of World of Wearable Arts. Galleries and venues across the city have been amazingly supportive of Nelson Jewelry Week from the get-go and this group assist has solely grown in 2023.
It could possibly be seen as a limitation that there are a finite variety of locations to point out work in established (public or non-public) galleries. However many companies have come on board to showcase work of their home windows, and this matches in with the ethos of the general public “occurring on” jewellery as a part of the on a regular basis. There are two public galleries, and 5 non-public galleries had been concerned on this yr’s NJW.
Vicki Mason: Inform us concerning the programmed occasion Buildings Want Jewelry. How did this initiative happened, how did it work logistically, and so on.?
Kay van Dyk and Katie Pascoe: Within the early 2000’s Stella Chrysostomou initiated Group Jewelry Tasks the place makers would come collectively for themed occasions associated to jewellery. One was known as Edible Jewelry, and one, initiated by Kay, was known as Buildings Want Jewelry. It was a flop, with solely Stella and me collaborating. In 2021 we reinstituted it and it has grown into an occasion imbedded into this system, venture managed by Katie each years.
The venture runs primarily as a group outreach program with native artists creating projections, sculptures, and interactive performances primarily based on adornment and object carrying. In 2023 we obtained funding from Inventive New Zealand and Nelson Metropolis Council to pay artists to supply work particularly for BNJ. Nationwide artists had been chosen from the EOIs concerned this time round.
Katie Pascoe: In 2001, Kay mentioned she would like to reignite the thought and I took up the problem to handle the venture. There was one thing within the idea of Buildings Want Jewelry that resonated with me. Firstly, I loved the absurdity of the idea.But additionally, my father was an architect and he cultivated in me an appreciation of artwork and structure. The venture opens up a wider dialog about materials tradition and the connection between objects and the physique on a a lot bigger scale.It positively falls into the jewelry-adjacent class, and begins to think about object and sculpture.
I really like the accessibility to artwork this venture gives to viewers and the best way artists get to reimagine how we view and use areas inside the metropolis. Klaasz Breukel’s projections of artworks onto buildings have been vastly loved each years. Highlights this yr had been Vernon Bowden’s A Tenth Ghost in Albion Sq., Williams + Williams Creep and Glitter, the interactive Glitter Wall Signage within the doorway at Purple Gallery, and Lee Woodman’s Laneway of Unreliable Artefacts.
Vicki Mason: In your web site you define one in all NJW’s goals as partaking with the broader public by inviting them to “view and take part in” your program of occasions. How did the general public have interaction? Did you might have a method of measuring this?
Kay van Dyk and Katie Pascoe: There have been many occasions the general public had been in a position to view and take part in, together with our “tender” opening occasion, Softly Softly, the place galleries opened within the night and other people wandered the CBD viewing works; Night Jewels tour the place works in home windows had been considered and artists talked about their exhibitions; night projections onto buildings and works in home windows allowed for incidental viewing of bijou, as effectively an out of doors set up in a public reserve the place folks might view the work and take away a brooch; café and bar Arden hosted Mandy Flood’s incredible venture, A Jeweller’s Recreation, the place folks might borrow a brooch whereas they ate and drank on the venue. Becky Bliss’s golden badges discovered on pavements, Macarena Bernal’s hyperlink expertise.
Katie Pascoe: These publicly accessible and unintended artwork encounters are vital, particularly the interactive ones, so folks can expertise jewellery as a wearer in an experimental method. This faucets into jewellery as an artwork type meant primarily to be worn—and opens up a dialog: Once we maintain an object or put it on our our bodies, how does that change us, or what does that say about us?
By having exhibitions exterior of an artwork gallery and in home windows or retailers or nontraditional areas, the edge of experiencing artwork is lowered. This comes again to supporting a philosophy of the advantages of artwork starting in our on a regular basis lives and the way it can change us and join us, how we will see ourselves and consider the locations we work together in another way, particularly in a extra playful and inventive method.
Vicki Mason: New Zealand jewelers punch effectively above their weight within the modern/artwork jewellery subject on the world stage. Why would possibly this be?
Katie Pascoe: That’s an enormous query! Possibly a assessment of Aotearoa modern jewellery follow must be finished to reply it!
Nonetheless some strengths come to thoughts. I believe makers from Aotearoa naturally faucet into the place we dwell. At instances there’s a hyperlocality to the work that tells a narrative of residing on this nation specifically. There’s something grounding in that. The exhibition Bone, Shell and Stone, in 1988, was a watershed second for modern artwork follow in Aotearoa. It instantly talked to residing right here on an island within the Pacific Ocean and allowed a distinct lens to view what’s valuable, and opened up a dialog round materiality specifically.
There are some superb people within the modern jewellery group—akin to Alan Preston, Areta Wilkinson, Warwick Freeman, Lisa Walker, Karl Fritsch—who present a ardour and dedication to their inventive follow and hold doing superb work that’s celebrated each nationally and on a world stage. That is of giant profit to our group. In addition they occur to be beneficiant people who give again to the group and have supported new makers developing.
Collaborative artist-run areas—like Fingers, in Tamaki Makarau Auckland, which began in 1974—have cultivated and supported artist practices. Fingers is about to rejoice its fiftieth birthday this yr. Ngā mihi nui to them, that’s an enormous achievement. Galleries like The Dowse, Objectspace, Masterworks, The Nationwide, and just lately Season and The Jewel and The Jeweller play an vital half in supporting and selling artwork and craft in Aotearoa, particularly modern jewellery practices.
Within the final decade, The Handshake Mission has supported and fostered inventive improvement by way of their mentoring and exhibition-based program (success accounts for a big a part of this over the previous 10 years) the place artists’ works have been taken out of NZ and onto the world stage at Talente, Schmuck, and Munich Jewelry Week.
Vicki Mason: Your program ran over 10 days, together with what appeared to be an intensive weekend program the primary weekend. Have you ever had an opportunity to talk with individuals concerning the size and format of this system?
Kay van Dyk and Katie Pascoe: Suggestions in 2021 requested that we embody extra workshops over an extended interval, so we programmed them over two weekends. There’s just one massive jewellery workshop in Nelson, at Nelson Marlborough Institute of Expertise.
Anecdotal suggestions concerning the combo of workshops, public talks, artist talks, and social occasions (pin swap, gig/dancing) is constructive. Individuals are coming from throughout NZ and wish alternatives to socialize and meet up with one another—many studied collectively. NZ jewellery persons are extremely supportive and beneficiant, plus they’re tremendous enjoyable and love celebration.
This yr’s program felt huge! Given our very small working crew, we’re reconsidering a seven-day format to maintain the vitality sustainable.
Vicki Mason: I hope you now personal some new jewels on account of the week. Inform us about a few of your latest acquisitions!
Katie Pascoe: NJW made a collector out of me. Buying items was a technique to bear in mind this yr’s pageant. Highlights embody a Jane Dodd Unbell brooch; Kay and I each invested in a brooch every that we will swap. It was such an honor to have Jane Dodd host a workshop, in addition to take part in an exhibition along with Anna Wallis, hosted by The Nationwide and Palm Boutique. I additionally love my Vanessa Arthur’s Wayfinder earrings and Marilyn Jones’ tender all-seeing eye from The Jewel and The Jeweller’s Buffet Showcase. I ended up buying two of the brooches from A Jeweller’s Recreation—the understated hard-lined great thing about Denise Callan’s Remnant Brooch and Amelia Rothwell’s all-softness Pillow Brooch. Alongside these, NJW artists provided some nice gem finds, together with Becky Bliss’s golden badge, Sarah Learn’s Pleasure Pin, and Vernon Bowden’s Marble Chip Brooch. I’m fortunately carrying all of those whereas I, Object, by Stella Chrysostomou, gives the right post-festival jewellery object studying materials.
Kay van Dyk: I coveted Raewyn Walsh’s rhinestone pumice brooch from the minute I noticed it. Jane Dodd’s Unbell brooch, a much-loved favourite that I name my “wee man,” filled with allure and character. Occupation: Artist’s badge. Vernon Bowen’s pin. Sharon Health gifted Katie and I an interactive necklace every; mine has a change, I strung it on lilac twine. Mandy Flood’s metal and enamel brooch (gained within the pin swap). I’ve gone on to buy two extra items since NJW. Like Katie, a brand new wave of gathering has come over me!
Vicki Mason: Thanks for speaking concerning the occasion!
