Chapter 5 of The Language of Fashion
For a long time, for centuries, perhaps even millennia, the gemstone was considered to be essentially a mineral substance; whether it was diamond or metal, precious stone or gold, it always came from the earth’s depth, from that sombre and fiery core, of which we see only the hardened and cooled products; in short, by its very origin, the gemstone was infernal object that had come through arduous, often bloody journeys, to leave behind those subterranean caverns where humanity’s mythic imagination stored its dead, its damned and its treasures in the same place.
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Extracted from hell, the gemstone came to symbolize hell, and took on its fundamental characteristic; the inhuman. Like stone (and stone provided a large amount of gems), it was associated above all with hardness; stone has always stood for the very essence of things, for the irremediable inanimate object; stone is neither life nor death, it represents the inert, the stubbornness of the thing to be nothing but itself; it is infinitely unchanging. It follows then, that stone is pitiless; whereas fire is cruel, and water crafty, stone is the despair of that which had never lived and will never do so, of that which obstinately resists all forms of life. Through the ages the gemstone extracted from its mineral origins its primary symbolic power: that of announcing an order as inflexible as that of things.
Nevertheless, humanity’s poetic imagination was able to conceive of stone that were made to wear out, noble, venerable stones, which grew old and so were, despite everything alive. As for the quintessential stone, the diamond, it is beyond time: never wearing, incorruptible, its limpidness forms the moral image of the most deadly of virtues – purity; in terms of substance, the diamond is pure, clean, almost aseptic; but whereas there are some purities that are tender, fragile (water for example), there are others that are sterile, cold, steely; for purity is life, but it can also be, by contrast, infertility, and the diamond is like the sterile son emerging from the deepest point of the earth, non-productive, incapable of rotting down, hence incapable of becoming the source of new life.
And yet, it seduces; hard and limpid, the diamond has a third symbolic quality: it glistens. Here it is incorporated into a new magical and poetic domain, that of the paradoxical substance, both lit up and stone cold: it is nothing but fire and yet nothing but ice.
![]()
This cold fire, this sharp, shinning object which is nevertheless silent, what a symbol for the whole world of vanities, of seductions devoid of content, if pleasure devoid of sincerity! For centuries, Christians humanity felt deeply (much more than we do today) the opposition between the world and solitude; thanks to its fire-like sparkle and its coldness, the diamond was this world, this abhorrent and fascinating order of ambition, flattery and disappointment, condemned by so many of our moralists – perhaps in order better to describe it.
And about gold, which was also used to make gemstone? Though originating in the earth and in hell, arriving first as ore or as a nugget, gold is a substance more intellectual than symbolic; it holds a fascination only within certain mercantile economies; it has no, or very little, poetic reality; it is only ever mentioned so as to show how this most mediocre of substances (a dull, yellow metal) clashes with the importance of its effects. But as a sign, what power it has! And it is precisely the sign per excellence, the sign of all the signs; it is absolute value, invested with all powers including those once held by magic: is it not able to appropriate everything, goods and virtue, lives and bodies? It is not to convert everything into its opposite, to lower and to elevate, to demean and to glorify? The all: owing to the fact that gold very quickly stopped being convertible or useful and so removed itself from any practical application, pure gold, whose usefulness was almost entirely self-referential, became superlative gold, absolute richness – here the gemstone becomes the very concept of price; it is worn like an idea, that of a terrific power, for it is enough to be seen for this power to be demonstrated.
![]()
There is no doubt that, fundamentally, the gemstone was a sign of superpower, that is of virility, and remained so for very long time (after all, it is only recently and under the puritan influenced of Quaker clothing, which is the origin of men’s clothing today, that men stopped wearing gemstone). So why it has been associated so constantly with woman, with her powers and her evil spells? It is because the husband very quickly delegated to his wife the job of showing off his wealth (certain sociologists use this to explain the origin of fashion): the wife provides poetic proof of wealth and power of the husband. Except that, as always with human society, a simple pattern is quickly invested with unexpected meanings, symbols and effects. Thus the primitive showing-off of wealth has been invaded by a whole mythology of woman: this mythology remains infernal, because woman give everything to own gemstones, and man would give everything to own that very woman who wears the gemstones that she has sold herself for; with gemstones as the link, woman gives herself up to the Devil, the husband to the woman, who has herself become a precious, hard stone: and we must not assume that symbolism of this sort, which is both prosaic, spiritual and, after all, naïve, belongs only to the barbarous periods in Western history. The whole of the Second Empire in France (1852-1871) for example was intoxicated and panic-stricken by the power of gemstones, by this capacity to induce human Evil, which for so long had been almost a physical property of diamond and gold: Zola’s Nana really is the grandiose and angry cry of a society destroying itself, or one might even say devouring itself, in two ways; woman is both a man-eater and a diamond-eater.
Such a mythology has not completely disappeared from our times: there are still fine jewellers, a world market in diamonds and thefts of famous gemstones. But their infernal aspect is clearly on the decline. First, because the mythology of woman has changed: in the novel, in films, woman is less and less the femme fatale, no longer the destroyer of men; she can no longer be essentialized, stopped from existing or made into a precious and dangerous object; she has rejoined the human race. And also gemstones, the great mythical gemstones, are barely worn nowadays; they are of historical value, only, sterilized, embalmed and kept away from female body, condemned to sit safe. In short, fashion – need I say more? – no longer speaks of the gemstone but only of jewellery.
Now fashion, as we know, is a language: though it, through the system of signs it sets up, no matter how fragile this may seem, our society – and not just that of women – exhibits, communicates its being, says what it thinks of the world: so, just as the gemstone basically expressed essentially theological nature of ancient society, so jewellery today, as seen in shops and in fashion magazines, merely follows, expresses and signifies our times – having originated in the ancestral world of the damned, the piece of jewellery has in one word become secularized.
First and foremost this secularization has visibly affected the very substance of jewellery; it is no longer made from just stone or metal, but also fragile or soft materials such as glass or wood. Furthermore, jewellery is no longer routinely given the job of showing off a prize that is, so to speak, inhuman: you see jewellery made of common metal, or inexpensive glass: and when jewellery imitates some precious substance, gold or pearls, it is shameless; the copy, now way of being rich on the cheap – it is quite open about itself, makes no attempt to deceive, only retaining the aesthetic qualities of the material it is imitating. In short, there has been a widespread liberation of jewellery; its definition is widening, it is now an object that is free, if one can say this, from prejudices; multiform, multisubstance, to be used in an infinite variety of ways, it is now no longer subservient to the law of highest price nor to the that of being used only one way, such as for a party or sacred occasion: jewellery has become democratic.
Of course, this democratization does not escape from new ways of conferring value. As long as wealth regulated the rarity of gemstones, the latter could judged by nothing but its price (that of its substance and of the work out into it); but once just about anyone could procure whatever they wanted, as soon as the work of art became a product, there had to be a way, in our democratic, but still differentiated, societies, of subjecting jewellery to another form of discrimination: and this is taste, of which fashion is precisely the judge and the keeper. So today we have jewellery of bad taste; and, rather paradoxically what defines bad taste in a piece of jewellery is curiously that which was once the very sign of its prestige and of its magical qualities: namely its highest price; not only is jewellery that is too rich or too heavy now discredited but conversely, for expensive jewellery to have good taste, its richness must be discreet, sober, visible certainly but only to those in the know.
So what counts as good taste in jewellery today? Quite simply this: no matter how little it costs, the piece of jewellery must be thought about in relation to the whole outfit it accompanies, it must be subjected to that essential functional value which is that of style. What is new, if you like, is that the piece of jewellery is no longer on its own; it is one term in a set of links that goes from the body to the clothing, to the accessory and includes the circumstances for which the whole outfit is being worn; it is part of an ensemble, and this ensemble is no longer necessarily ceremonial: taste can be everything, at work, in the country, in the morning, in the winter, and the piece of jewellery follows suits; it is no longer a singular, dazzling, magical object, conceived as a way of ornamenting and thus making woman look at her best; it is now humble and more active, an element of clothing which enters into an equal relationship with a material, with a particular cut or with another accessory.
So it is precisely its smallest, its finished look, its very substance as the opposite of the fluidity of fabrics, that makes the piece of jewellery part of fashion and it has become almost like the soul in the general economy of clothing: that is, the detail. It was inevitable that, in making taste into the product of a subtle set of functions, fashion would give more and more weight to the simple presence of the element no matter how small and without regard for its physical importance; this gives rise to the highest value in today’s fashion being placed on anything insignificant in size but which is able to modify, harmonize, animate the structure of a set of clothes, and it is called precisely (but from now with a lot of respect) a next-to-nothing. The piece of jewellery is a next-to-nothing, but out of this next-to-nothing comes great energy. Often inexpensive, sold in simple ‘boutiques’ and no longer in the temples of jewellery shops, available in a variety of materials, free styles (often including the exotic even), in short depreciated in the true sense of the word, in its physical state, the most modest piece of jewellery remains the vital element in getting dressed, because it underlines the desire for order, for composition, for intelligence. Analogous to those half-chemical, half-magical, substances which act all the more forcefully by virtue of their infinitesimal size, the piece of jewellery reigns over clothing not because it is absolutely precious but because it plays a crucial role in making clothing mean something. It is meaning in a style which now becomes precious and this meaning depends, not on each element, but on the link between them and in this link it is the detached tem (a pocket, a flower, a scarf, a piece of jewellery) that holds the ultimate power of signification. This is true that is not only analytical but also poetic: this great journey across centuries and across societies, from the gemstone to jewellery, it is the very same itinerary that has transformed the cold, luxurious stones in the Baudelairian universe into those trinkets, pieces of jewellery and next-to-nothing in which Mallarme could then enclose a whole metaphysics of the new power of Man to make the tiniest of thing with meaning.
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The book Language of Fashion by Roland Barthes was first published in France, 2004, by Editions du Seuill
The article From Gemstones to Jewellery was first published in Jardin des Arts, 77 (April), 1961; Oeuvres complétes vol. 1, 911-14.
Illustrations and collages by AMBER IBARRECHE
Extracted from hell, the gemstone came to symbolize hell, and took on its fundamental characteristic; the inhuman. Like stone (and stone provided a large amount of gems), it was associated above all with hardness; stone has always stood for the very essence of things, for the irremediable inanimate object; stone is neither life nor death, it represents the inert, the stubbornness of the thing to be nothing but itself; it is infinitely unchanging. It follows then, that stone is pitiless; whereas fire is cruel, and water crafty, stone is the despair of that which had never lived and will never do so, of that which obstinately resists all forms of life. Through the ages the gemstone extracted from its mineral origins its primary symbolic power: that of announcing an order as inflexible as that of things.
Nevertheless, humanity’s poetic imagination was able to conceive of stone that were made to wear out, noble, venerable stones, which grew old and so were, despite everything alive. As for the quintessential stone, the diamond, it is beyond time: never wearing, incorruptible, its limpidness forms the moral image of the most deadly of virtues – purity; in terms of substance, the diamond is pure, clean, almost aseptic; but whereas there are some purities that are tender, fragile (water for example), there are others that are sterile, cold, steely; for purity is life, but it can also be, by contrast, infertility, and the diamond is like the sterile son emerging from the deepest point of the earth, non-productive, incapable of rotting down, hence incapable of becoming the source of new life.
And yet, it seduces; hard and limpid, the diamond has a third symbolic quality: it glistens. Here it is incorporated into a new magical and poetic domain, that of the paradoxical substance, both lit up and stone cold: it is nothing but fire and yet nothing but ice.
This cold fire, this sharp, shinning object which is nevertheless silent, what a symbol for the whole world of vanities, of seductions devoid of content, if pleasure devoid of sincerity! For centuries, Christians humanity felt deeply (much more than we do today) the opposition between the world and solitude; thanks to its fire-like sparkle and its coldness, the diamond was this world, this abhorrent and fascinating order of ambition, flattery and disappointment, condemned by so many of our moralists – perhaps in order better to describe it.
And about gold, which was also used to make gemstone? Though originating in the earth and in hell, arriving first as ore or as a nugget, gold is a substance more intellectual than symbolic; it holds a fascination only within certain mercantile economies; it has no, or very little, poetic reality; it is only ever mentioned so as to show how this most mediocre of substances (a dull, yellow metal) clashes with the importance of its effects. But as a sign, what power it has! And it is precisely the sign per excellence, the sign of all the signs; it is absolute value, invested with all powers including those once held by magic: is it not able to appropriate everything, goods and virtue, lives and bodies? It is not to convert everything into its opposite, to lower and to elevate, to demean and to glorify? The all: owing to the fact that gold very quickly stopped being convertible or useful and so removed itself from any practical application, pure gold, whose usefulness was almost entirely self-referential, became superlative gold, absolute richness – here the gemstone becomes the very concept of price; it is worn like an idea, that of a terrific power, for it is enough to be seen for this power to be demonstrated.
There is no doubt that, fundamentally, the gemstone was a sign of superpower, that is of virility, and remained so for very long time (after all, it is only recently and under the puritan influenced of Quaker clothing, which is the origin of men’s clothing today, that men stopped wearing gemstone). So why it has been associated so constantly with woman, with her powers and her evil spells? It is because the husband very quickly delegated to his wife the job of showing off his wealth (certain sociologists use this to explain the origin of fashion): the wife provides poetic proof of wealth and power of the husband. Except that, as always with human society, a simple pattern is quickly invested with unexpected meanings, symbols and effects. Thus the primitive showing-off of wealth has been invaded by a whole mythology of woman: this mythology remains infernal, because woman give everything to own gemstones, and man would give everything to own that very woman who wears the gemstones that she has sold herself for; with gemstones as the link, woman gives herself up to the Devil, the husband to the woman, who has herself become a precious, hard stone: and we must not assume that symbolism of this sort, which is both prosaic, spiritual and, after all, naïve, belongs only to the barbarous periods in Western history. The whole of the Second Empire in France (1852-1871) for example was intoxicated and panic-stricken by the power of gemstones, by this capacity to induce human Evil, which for so long had been almost a physical property of diamond and gold: Zola’s Nana really is the grandiose and angry cry of a society destroying itself, or one might even say devouring itself, in two ways; woman is both a man-eater and a diamond-eater.
Such a mythology has not completely disappeared from our times: there are still fine jewellers, a world market in diamonds and thefts of famous gemstones. But their infernal aspect is clearly on the decline. First, because the mythology of woman has changed: in the novel, in films, woman is less and less the femme fatale, no longer the destroyer of men; she can no longer be essentialized, stopped from existing or made into a precious and dangerous object; she has rejoined the human race. And also gemstones, the great mythical gemstones, are barely worn nowadays; they are of historical value, only, sterilized, embalmed and kept away from female body, condemned to sit safe. In short, fashion – need I say more? – no longer speaks of the gemstone but only of jewellery.
Now fashion, as we know, is a language: though it, through the system of signs it sets up, no matter how fragile this may seem, our society – and not just that of women – exhibits, communicates its being, says what it thinks of the world: so, just as the gemstone basically expressed essentially theological nature of ancient society, so jewellery today, as seen in shops and in fashion magazines, merely follows, expresses and signifies our times – having originated in the ancestral world of the damned, the piece of jewellery has in one word become secularized.
First and foremost this secularization has visibly affected the very substance of jewellery; it is no longer made from just stone or metal, but also fragile or soft materials such as glass or wood. Furthermore, jewellery is no longer routinely given the job of showing off a prize that is, so to speak, inhuman: you see jewellery made of common metal, or inexpensive glass: and when jewellery imitates some precious substance, gold or pearls, it is shameless; the copy, now way of being rich on the cheap – it is quite open about itself, makes no attempt to deceive, only retaining the aesthetic qualities of the material it is imitating. In short, there has been a widespread liberation of jewellery; its definition is widening, it is now an object that is free, if one can say this, from prejudices; multiform, multisubstance, to be used in an infinite variety of ways, it is now no longer subservient to the law of highest price nor to the that of being used only one way, such as for a party or sacred occasion: jewellery has become democratic.
Of course, this democratization does not escape from new ways of conferring value. As long as wealth regulated the rarity of gemstones, the latter could judged by nothing but its price (that of its substance and of the work out into it); but once just about anyone could procure whatever they wanted, as soon as the work of art became a product, there had to be a way, in our democratic, but still differentiated, societies, of subjecting jewellery to another form of discrimination: and this is taste, of which fashion is precisely the judge and the keeper. So today we have jewellery of bad taste; and, rather paradoxically what defines bad taste in a piece of jewellery is curiously that which was once the very sign of its prestige and of its magical qualities: namely its highest price; not only is jewellery that is too rich or too heavy now discredited but conversely, for expensive jewellery to have good taste, its richness must be discreet, sober, visible certainly but only to those in the know.
So what counts as good taste in jewellery today? Quite simply this: no matter how little it costs, the piece of jewellery must be thought about in relation to the whole outfit it accompanies, it must be subjected to that essential functional value which is that of style. What is new, if you like, is that the piece of jewellery is no longer on its own; it is one term in a set of links that goes from the body to the clothing, to the accessory and includes the circumstances for which the whole outfit is being worn; it is part of an ensemble, and this ensemble is no longer necessarily ceremonial: taste can be everything, at work, in the country, in the morning, in the winter, and the piece of jewellery follows suits; it is no longer a singular, dazzling, magical object, conceived as a way of ornamenting and thus making woman look at her best; it is now humble and more active, an element of clothing which enters into an equal relationship with a material, with a particular cut or with another accessory.
So it is precisely its smallest, its finished look, its very substance as the opposite of the fluidity of fabrics, that makes the piece of jewellery part of fashion and it has become almost like the soul in the general economy of clothing: that is, the detail. It was inevitable that, in making taste into the product of a subtle set of functions, fashion would give more and more weight to the simple presence of the element no matter how small and without regard for its physical importance; this gives rise to the highest value in today’s fashion being placed on anything insignificant in size but which is able to modify, harmonize, animate the structure of a set of clothes, and it is called precisely (but from now with a lot of respect) a next-to-nothing. The piece of jewellery is a next-to-nothing, but out of this next-to-nothing comes great energy. Often inexpensive, sold in simple ‘boutiques’ and no longer in the temples of jewellery shops, available in a variety of materials, free styles (often including the exotic even), in short depreciated in the true sense of the word, in its physical state, the most modest piece of jewellery remains the vital element in getting dressed, because it underlines the desire for order, for composition, for intelligence. Analogous to those half-chemical, half-magical, substances which act all the more forcefully by virtue of their infinitesimal size, the piece of jewellery reigns over clothing not because it is absolutely precious but because it plays a crucial role in making clothing mean something. It is meaning in a style which now becomes precious and this meaning depends, not on each element, but on the link between them and in this link it is the detached tem (a pocket, a flower, a scarf, a piece of jewellery) that holds the ultimate power of signification. This is true that is not only analytical but also poetic: this great journey across centuries and across societies, from the gemstone to jewellery, it is the very same itinerary that has transformed the cold, luxurious stones in the Baudelairian universe into those trinkets, pieces of jewellery and next-to-nothing in which Mallarme could then enclose a whole metaphysics of the new power of Man to make the tiniest of thing with meaning.
The book Language of Fashion by Roland Barthes was first published in France, 2004, by Editions du Seuill
The article From Gemstones to Jewellery was first published in Jardin des Arts, 77 (April), 1961; Oeuvres complétes vol. 1, 911-14.
Illustrations and collages by AMBER IBARRECHE
Images by Joseph Fox
Catwalk images by Pacific Coast News
There aren’t many fashionable options for emergency rainwear. Our answer is a specially-coated Tyvek poncho, featherlight, extremely packable and just the thing for flash floods, festivals or urban commutes.
Edition of 5
Design Critical +
A glowing Christ, lovingly held within His own cathedral, ready to be clamped to any surface.
Edition of 10
Design Critical +
Want to make an impression at the next party? Stand out from the crowd with our designer cigarettes, lovingly creased, packed, gilded and nestled in a distinctive box. Each box contains 10 cigarettes.
Edition unlimited
Design Critical +
When we came across this fantastically colored composite rubber we intuitively knew that it was perfect for a belt. It was traded for a contact lens, and the rest is history. Made to size.
Edition of 100
Design Adam Grinovich, Charles Mathis
The first thing to get lost at parties is your favorite lighter. Make sure you never lose your fire, while wearing a distinctively functional piece of jewelry.
Edition of 100
Design Annika Pettersson
Beautifully functional objects are tossed into the trash every day. We find these steel containers and transform them into ideal apartment speakers. Sold as a pair. Bluetooth enabled.
Edition of 50
Design Critical +
We have noticed a severe lack of decent looking ‘Water pipes’ on the market, so decided to produce our own. All useless adornment and cliches have been removed, resulting in a special object that can be appreciated for its formal elegance while at the same time functioning as well as anything currently on the market. 3d-printed in black satin ceramic. Removable glass slide included.
Edition of 100
Design Critical +
This pouch is inspired by a group of street youths in downtown Rotterdam. Adjustable to fit around the neck or to be slung around the shoulder. Leather and steel hardware assure its safety in perilous environments.
Edition of 3
Design Adam Grinovich
THE EXHIBITION THAT NEVER HAPPENED
Scenography and photography by SAGEL AND KRZYKOWSKI
(Matylda Krzykowski + Christoph Sagel)
Initiated by Current Obsession
The Exhibition That Never Happened is an exhibition you can hold in your hands, which developed from the physical experience of the actual pieces and the real-life curated show into a two-dimensional representation of itself printed on paper and later on textile, becoming tangible (and possibly wearable) again. Shifting common contexts and creating new dimensions for jewellery is why we made The Exhibition That Never Happened.
A two-dimensional curated show is an exhibition that a magazine can offer. The number of printed copies equals the number of invited guests, but they do not need to stand around in a crowded space, distracted by the buzz of the opening. Each gets an individual visual sensation and experience.
Matylda Krzykowski:
"I am an exhibition maker. Current Obsession asked me to work with them because I can, to quote the editors “create images”. My view on jewellery comes from a product and object-related context. Through my blog MATANDME I have been in touch with a fair amount of designers, many of which I’ve worked with and sourced for their ways of relating to design. This eventually lead me to co-founding Depot Basel, place for contemporary design, where I have curated numerous exhibitions.
For The Exhibition That Never Happened we’ve selected jewellery by young designers focusing on the potential of each individual object. As curator I was aiming to find one piece that holds the attitude of each jeweller’s general work – a reference piece. The result is an overview of new, sometimes undiscovered work, for which the context hasn’t been fully defined.
The obsolete notion that jewellery is handmade in silver or gold and that the more you wear it, the more it defines you, has shifted towards wearable objects or small-sized sculptures that exist on their own. This certainly caught my attention.
The Exhibition That Never Happened is set in a black room, a darkroom with extreme light, allowing each colourful piece to shine. It is a presentation of formality - aiming to introduce the selection in full control. Christoph Sagel, still-life photographer from Berlin, a master of lighting, with whom I’ve been working since 2012, is the right person to give the pieces a dramatic editorial stage, where jewellery comes across as desirable two-dimensional objects."
The Exhibition is featured in the #2 issue of the CURRENT OBSESSION magazine.
ORDER IT ONLINE
Florian Milker – Digital Precision
GOLDSMITH, JEWELLERY DESIGNER
Kunsthochschule Burg Giebichenstein, Halle Saale, DE, 2015
Florian did an apprenticeship as a Goldsmith – a classic playground with its limitations. Soon he turned to 3D programs. The B_Serie is made by laser sinter process. “I like the gentle surface, the low weight possibility and the precision of the technique.” Florian will graduate in 2015.
Shana Teugels – Shaped Kitsch
JEWELLERY DESIGNER
St. Lucas University College of Art & Design, BE, 2010
Shana uses polypropylene, resin, plastic beads, and glitter glue – a combination of cheap materials that came from an intense research on kitsch and resulted in experiments of endless shaping options.
Nelly Zagury – 2D To 3D Fantasy
HANDS-ON ART DIRECTOR
Ecole Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs of Strasbourg, FR, 2011
Nelly creates a mythological world, where jewellery is a relic of her fantasy, a hybrid object, which looks like a whip or a penis. She creates ornamental objects playing with symbolism of adornment.
Ejing Zhang – Tradition Encounters Interaction
TEXTILE DESIGNER
MA Royal College of Art, UK, 2013
Ejing made an abacus out of essential materials and tools - bobbins and paintbrushes.
Abacus was the calculating method taught everywhere in China when she was little. The thread winding, the plastic, and the wood all came from that abacus. She is interested in jewellery as something interacting with the body and not having limitations of being soft fabric.
Patricia Domingues – Reconstructed Material
JEWELLERY DESIGNER
MA Hochschule Trier, Fachrichtung Edelstein und Schmuck, Idar-Oberstein, DE, 2013
Reconstructed material is a massive block, without anything, any line, any detail, and any imperfection. It does not matter the angle you cut, it will always be the same. Whatever you make will only add something to this naked block.
He Jing – Readymade Liaison
JEWELLERY DESIGNER
Jewellery department at Gerrit Rietveld Academie, NL, 2013
Jing appreciates normal-looking, mass-produced things, because they are simple, durable, and functional. They are full of hints in details. She imagines the reasons why people made them and how people treat them. When she makes the work with ready-mades, she is ‘collaborating’ with them.
Wei Mao – Right Material
JEWELLERY DESIGNER
BA fashion Jewellery at London College of Fashion, UK, 2013
The work is based on dessert-making and cream-piping. Wei researched the material that is soft and fluid enough to go through a piping nozzle, while not being too soft or too fluid to keep the shape. She tried plaster, jesmonite, resin, silicone and etc., eventually found polymer clay material. It is also pure white, which makes it easy to get any colour palette.
Maiko Gubler - Experiments Within Hybrid Spaces
ART DIRECTOR/IMAGE-MAKER
Visual Communication at The Berlin University of the Arts, DE, 2000
Maiko is interested in printing technology and 3D modelling. She experiments within hybrid spaces and explores the intrinsic qualities of three-dimensional computer-aided imagery and objects. ”The intersection where things are lacking definition and have a sense of unease is what I’m interested in. I’d like to invite people to think about the obsolete real/digital distinctions differently and to expand their notion of spatiality and things.”
Boris de Beijer– Artefacts From The Far Future
DESIGNER & DJ
Jewellery department at Gerrit Rietveld Academie, NL, 2011
Boris deals with historic context of jewellery, rather than it's contemporary relevance. “Jewellery pieces are not even meant to be worn by humans”. Invents his own material by combining and excessively experimenting with existing raw materials and found objects - mixture of different resins at the base for each piece. Due to its unpredictable and aggressive behaviour, the outcome of the raw bloc is always a surprise, always unique and therefore it is impossible to duplicate a piece. “It's a lot like alchemy.”
Marina Stanimirovic – Juxtaposition Of Sculpture Or Design Object
JEWELLERY DESIGNER
Goldsmithing, Silversmithing, Metalwork & Jewellery department at Royal College of Art, UK, 2013
“Because even if you can’t wear it to go to work or go buy some food, the fact that it has been designed for the body, makes the piece the most intimate sculpture or design object.”
Marina used Corian®, resin mixed with powder of stone, because when you touch it, it is a really cold and heavy material, but also really soft to carve: two antithetic notions.
this year we are greeted by the shipping crates of studio Job throughout the city, intentionally tagged with quotes like, ‘is a cunt, is a jerk...’
This first day of a Design Week, what do we do? We go to openings! But before all that begins, let’s step up into the Lichttoren and have a good look at the city from above.
As we move down to the first floor of the Lichttoren, we catch the marvellous exhibition by Vlisco, a famous Dutch textile company which produces Batek on 100% cotton since 1846. This is the first time ever Vlisco shares the rich history of the company, tales of their fabrics and previews of their new range of products in an exhibition hence the title - Vlisco Unfolded. 
the entrance of the exhibition - Vlisco Unfolded
from sketch to print
Hommage a l’Art by Tomi Oladipo
Unseen Collection, August 2013
tunnel of photographs from some of the advertising campaigns
Sample Books, 1850-1920 production samples
And then... there was the opening of the Modebelofte at the Kazerene, where Current Obsession is currently exhibiting!
opening speech by Ellen Albers, owner of the YOU ARE HERE store
The Kazerne is an old fire department building. During the Dutch Design Week, the Kazerne hosts the Modebelofte, showcasing fashion and technology, a fine dining restaurant and a design exhibtion by Moon en Co.
shattered glass tranformed into jewellery and accessories
Daphna Laurens bottle stopper installation
Afke Goldstein & Floris Bakker
From an old building, we move to one of the most modern architecture in the city, the Van Abbe Museum. This year, the Van Abbe Museum open it’s doors to the public by showcasing part of the Design Academy graduates, a selection of works from recent graduates of European design schools and exploration of materials.
Timber by Vincent Tarisien (ECAL,Lausanne)
Inclusive Design DIY Workshop by Daijiro Mizuno, 2011
Royal Amateur Expedition Society, Rural is Radical by Tom Gottelier (RCA, London)
Plastic samples
Drawn from Clay by Atelier NL
The Second Self Loboratory by Jan Pieter Kaptein. A goodbye kiss!
After looking at some amazing works and having some drinks with the different mascots of Jan Pieter Kaptein’s the Second Self Laboratory, we move on to our final opening of the day, Objects to Play. This takes place in a new industrial part of the city which is shifting into a creative hub, Strijp-T. Every year, Objects display works of a group of designers evolving a theme, last year was money and this year, play!
Mirrors by Brit van Nerven
Formation Carpet by OS ∆ OOS
Spikkeld by Aukje Fleur Janssen
Shift, Split, Slide by Lex Pott
we don’t just drink at an opening, we eat, Glitter Pumpkin Lollipops presented by the lovely Lotte van Wulfften Palthe
Finally, we bid you goodbye from the Ketelhuisplein’s gigantic rain boots!!! Something which comes in very handy in this city!
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Text and images by Jing, Malaysia-born Netherlands-based designer/multimaker and the Queen of Everything.
xx
Current Obsession
www.thisisjiiing.com
www.bighairybruisedhill.tumblr.com
There is a mechanic inside every man. Boys love to play with toy blocks and as they reach adulthood, their fascination for building and machinery continues. However, it may never occur to a man that he can find similar joy from playing with his own face: the face as a playground for grown men. 'Screw Yourself' is a collection of facial jewellery, inspired by toy blocks and held in place with screws. Discover this new dimension of manly fun and let your inner mechanic run wild.
www.peterhsieh.com
Traces of an old building, see the ageing space come together with futuristic materials at the Modebelofte
Sadie Williams, Great Britain
Ana Rajcevic, Serbia
Jantine van Peski, The Netherlands
Miriam de Waard, The Netherlands
Xiao Li, China
Mi-Ah Rodiger, Germany
Raffaela Graspointner, Austria
Jef Montes, The Netherlands
Jaimee McKenna, Great Britain
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Text and images by Jing, Malaysia-born Netherlands-based designer/multimaker and the Queen of Everything.
xx
Current Obsession
www.thisisjiiing.com
www.bighairybruisedhill.tumblr.com
You know you are at the Dutch Design Week when you see a cycling path, red flag and old industrial architecture - the route to Strijp
Hanging: Bluered - blankets by Tinctoria and Belen
ground: Falling Rocks - tables by Tinctoria and Belen
Falling Rocks - tables by Tinctoria and Belen
Falling Rocks - tables by Tinctoria and Belen
a meeting of soft and hard
Well Proven Chair by marjan van Aubel & James Shaw
Illumination by Designation by Willem van Doorn
Miniature model of Illumination by Designation by Willem van Doorn
Recent graduates from the postgraduate program of Central Saint martins have come together with a selection of works which narrates materials, be it from nature itself or imaginary futurustic materials.
Giovanni Marmont questions the perception of things. With this project, he aims to stimulate people’s imagination, make them question their relationship with the objects they live with and leave room for them to reflect, interpret, play and take risk.
Transforming the Ambiguous by Giovanni Marmont
Yesenia Thibault-Picazo imagines how mining would be in the future. She observes and catalysed the slow geological phenomenon to manufacture human-made minerals out of the most distinctive materials of our epoch (aluminium, bones, plastics).
Craft in the Anthropocene by Yesenia Thibault-Picazo
Possible artifacts of the future : Craft in the Anthropocene by Yesenia Thibault-Picazo
Feeling the material : Craft in the Anthropocene by Yesenia Thibault-Picazo
Helene Combal Weiss worships modern industrial manufactured materials. She investigates the ancient practice of animism which is the belief of natural physical entities possess a spiritual essence. Her investigation shows how industrailly manufactured products and materials could potentially become icons of our time.
Inspirational video : Industrial Animism by Helene Combal Weiss
Industrial Animism by Helene Combal Weiss
Amy Radcliffe records scents like camera captures images. She thinks if an analogue, amateur-friendly system of odour capture and synthesis could be developed, we could see a profound change in the way we regard the use and effect of smells in our daily lives.
Scent-Ography:A Post-Visual Past Time by Amy Radcliffe
Beautiful perfume bottles inspired a mpoule (the 'film'): Scent-Ography: A Post-Visual Past Time by Amy Radcliffe
Loekie Smeets celebrates the physical transformation of natural materials. She works towards a more resourceful and sustainable future, she believes we can harness the smart sensing systems inherent to natural materials.
Smart by Nature by Loekie Smeets
Bricks : Smart by Nature by Loekie Smeets
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Text and images by Jing, Malaysia-born Netherlands-based designer/multimaker and the Queen of Everything.
xx
Current Obsession
www.thisisjiiing.com
www.bighairybruisedhill.tumblr.com
Ionie Chamilaki + Titia Dane
www.ioia.nl
http://ericgiraudet.com
Quynh Dong (CH) appropriates the playful aesthetics derived from video clips, soaps and fantasy films in her videos and performances. By constructing artificial worlds she reflects on the real world in which media consumption has become overwhelming and overpowering. Although popular media have become increasingly exempt from geographical and cultural parameters, Quynh Dong infuses them with her own personal memories. Besides playful and romantic, her sometimes aggressive use of kitsch is therefore also nostalgic, even sad.
www.quynhdong.ch
Paulien Barbas (NL) switching between the two-dimensional realm of photography and the three-dimensional properties of sculpture. Paulien Barbas unearths the incongruence between reality and perception. By showing various sides of the same object simultaneously, or juxtaposing process and product., she seeks to explore ways in which (mis)perception creates space for fantasy and the unexpected. Barbas finds poetry in the flawed; technical 'errors' become welcome abstractions that provide the starting point for new ideas to take shape.
www.paulienbarbas.com
Danielle van Ark (NL) makes use of different (sub)cultural languages and examine the passing of time. By appropriating objects and manipulating existing content related to socio-cultural status, the mostly labour-intensive works of Danielle van Ark show the fragility of life and explore her own position as an artist today.
www.daniellevanark.com
Carlos Irijalba (ES) investigates the physical properties of a given terrain. Using the environment as a material in his work, his practice is primarily three-three-dimentional and interventional, the outcome of which is recorded in photographs and videos. A work that is sceptical about human culture - it uses the states of matter to place the human scale in relation to other existing dynamics, such as geology. Another space of flows that opens relative velocities and materializations.
www.carlosirijalba.com
Karishma D'souza (IN). These paintings are containers or palimpsests of a physiological world filled wit memories of places , stories and people. The works are sights of acknowledgement of the lived experience - of the dignity of journeys, of stitched tighter personal realities. Though painted in a realistic fashion with careful concern for perspectival, a dreamlike world unfolds on the canvas.
www.theentamasha.blogspot.com
Goeun Bae (KR) begins with clues that can be found in daily life, sensed from the female perspective. The body part is not simply used as a 'piece' of the body, but operates as a performative extension. Her films, performances, objects, installations and photographs experiment with total detachment and obsessive repetition, asking the viewer to piece the puzzles together themsleves.
Oscar Abraham Pabón (VE) seeks the sculptural in the quotidian by using the geometric qualities of fabric and other organic materials as the basis for a modern aesthetic. Anything from Persian rugs to towels moulded into shape with Maizena and photocopies of his own hands can function as a geometrical sculpture or architectural model. Pabón translates his concern for detail into large-scale designs meant for public spaces, thus synchronizing the functional with the ornamental.
More work:
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On Sunday 8th of December from 3pm to 5pm you are cordially invited to Eindhoven's best fashion store YOU ARE HERE to celebrate #2 YOUTH issue of CURRENT OBSESSION and its cover story The Exhibition That Never Happened.
For The Exhibition That Never Happened we’ve selected jewellery by young designers focusing on the potential of each individual object. Each piece of jewellery was printed larger then life on 1x1m silk&cotton scarves. When being worn as a scarf, jewellery becomes an abstract shape, a color, a graphic element or a pattern.
Please stop by for some delicious handmade chocolate + glass of prosecco!
At YOU ARE HERE: Kleine Berg 32a, Eindhoven
Starting this week you can order your favourite limited edition scarf on our webshop.
ORDER ONLINE
The Exhibition That Never Happened is an exhibition you can hold in your hands. Developed from a real-life curated show into a two-dimensional representation of itself printed on the pages of CURRENT OBSESSION magazine and later on textile, it becomes tangible and wearable again. Shifting common contexts and creating new dimensions for jewellery is why we made The Exhibition That Never Happened.
Project The Exhibition That Never Happened initiated by CURRENT OBSESSION
Photography and scenography by SAGEL AND KRZYKOWSKI
Fabric print by Print Unlimited
Model on the image above Julia Fischer
Photography by Rachel de Joode
Concept by Marcel van Kan
Presentation of the limited edition scarves at the YOU ARE HERE store, Eindhoven
Day-to-day
Brooch
Bread, gold, iron, rock crystal
M
Cuff
Salt, iron, lace, knitting
Villu Plink
Crime
Brooch, 2011
Silver, iron, aluminium, paintbrush
Very quietly
Objects, 2012-2013
Glued vinyl records, painted timber sheets
Eve Margus-Villems
Serenity
Brooch
Engraved horn, white gold
Forsaken
Brooch
Engraved horn, jade, white gold
Rubrum
Brooch
Engraved fire opal, white gold
Piret Hirv
After Rain 2
Brooch
Silver, white gold
After Storm
Objekt
Silver, marble
Calm
Brooch
Silver
Kadri Mälk
Downcast Face
Brooch
Rhodium plated white gold, black baroque pearl, 5 black diamonds, black diamond dust
Swift
Earrings
White gold, rock crystal
Guilty
Brooch
Engraved jet, rhodium plated white gold, spinels
Tanel Veenre
Majestic
Sceptre
Leg of dark unicorn, Horn, coral, silver
Heart II
Brooch
Wood, mother of pearl, artificial resin, rose quartz, silver
Immaculate
Brooch
Fossilized sea urchin, horn, artificial resin, silver, cosmic dust
If you are planning an event during Schmuck'14, please fill in this form to ensure your place in the CURRENT OBSESSION PAPER. Early registration will give CURRENT OBSESSION more time to work on your feature. Deadline for registration is 10th of January 2014.
Fill out my Wufoo form!
"The time on my side", 4 containers
2011, eucalyptus fiber, newsprint, glue, glass, wood charcoal, chlorophyll, glass powder
Barbara Schrobenhauser graduated about a year ago from the Akademie der Bildenden Künste, class of Otto Künzli. Things like tactility, surface, weight, structure and concealment play important role in her work.
"My way to a piece very often comes through a working method. I look for my way to work with a material and walk along that way, looking around in my mind. After experimenting I make my decisions and my choices. I let my hands work while the outcome makes me think. I want to get astonished at the end of the working process. I am curious so I make."
"The time on my side", brooch, newsprint, charcoal, glue, some with glass
"The time on my side", brooch, Eucalyptus paper, glue, silver, stainless steel
"Ring" pendant, 2012, graph paper, string
There is more to Barbara's work then meets the eye. Each piece needs to be experiences and examined. The subtlety and simplicity meets a kind of immaculately executed deception. Hundreds of sheets of aluminium foil or graph paper are carefully layered and 'trimmed' so the piece appears as a solid whole. In case of aluminium pieces one can actually thumb through superfine and delicate layers...
"Aluminum 3", 2013, aluminum foil, leather string
More information about Barbara's work (in German) here
Runway jewellery by Tauba Auerbach for Ohne Titel SS11 
Collaboration of Tauba Auerbach and Ohne Titel for MOVE!
MOVE! is a series of collaborative performances and temporary installations created by fashion designers teamed up directly with artists.
Pop-up book
[2,3]
2011
Paper, ink, binder's board, glue, fabric, silk screen
Closed: 20.75 x 16.5 x 4.5 inches
52.71 x 41.91 x 11.43 cm. Open: Dimensions variable.
The Auerglass is a two person pump organ created by Tauba Auerbach and Cameron Mesirow (aka Glasser).. The instrument cannot be played alone. Each player has a keyboard with alternating notes of a four octave scale. Each player must pump to supply the wind to the other player's notes.
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Images used in this post are not property of CURRENT OBSESSION and belong to their rightful owners. Images were taken from the following websites:
www.fashionologie.com
www.taubaauerbach.com
www.ohnetitel.com
www.arrestedmotion.com
If these images belong to you and you would like them removed, please contact us.
Giant Earrings. An installation at store in Tokyo.
Part of teratotera: an art project that focuses on the local area between Koenji to Kichijoji on the JR Chuo line in Tokyo.
Earrings Book. Paper earrings, photography and design by Anna Gleesson. Model: Jenny Soo Yeon Lee.
See more Anna's work here