After Lost and Found
At the core of this collection is flux. The fluidity of meaning and importance assigned to an array of items of random background. The key to meaningfulness is in the right location to fulfil a purpose – any item that has fallen out of context, loses its value and becomes trash; unless it is given a new lease of life in a new context.
The jewellery selected for this site plays with this idea. It secures the previously stranded bits and pieces and gives them a safe setting – the safety chain necklaces fixing buttons found in Brick Lane with safety pins – provide a particularly clear example of this. The preciousness of these lost and then found objects resides exactly in their age. Unlike a consumer product fresh off the assembly line, full of promise, these previous generations of buttons have a history and this is what sets them apart and gives them a value. The jewellery design ensures their preservation and indicates their value.
Similarly the kimble brooches make sure that a found button will not be lost again. Normally they are encountered by the avid consumer in plastic form, but here they have been transformed into part of the jewellery themselves. They no longer fix the price tag until the item has been purchased and claimed by the new owner, instead they are here to stay. They have moved centre stage together with the lost button.
Also the Ceramic Brooch Necklaces emphasise the importance of keeping the shard in its new place. Having taken on a new guise as a precious object, the shard can embark on a whole new journey. As a piece of jewellery it will also gain a personal significance for its owner, who will most likely over time attach a sentiment to it.
The brooches for found earings evoke the history of finding and ordering objects according to taxonomist ideals. Each find can be neatly slotted into the perforation at the top of the brooch, where it will stay to be admired. Having been categorised, found objects served as the basis of the understanding of our world in Victorian times. Today the right setting determines the value attached to arte facts. Arranged in gallery displays or in show cases of exclusive shops, objects change hands for far more than their material value. In most cases this is because they have acquired a new meaning, aesthetic, historic, idealistic or otherwise.
By Kristine Von Oehsen
