Tags
I told you that I’ll be back with more interviews from the wonderful NOI artists, who are currently exhibiting at the Lalaouni Jewellery Museum from 09.11-31.12.2011 here in Athens.
This is the second interview conducted another member of the team, Joanne Huang.
Name: S.P. Joanne Huang
Born: 1979, Taiwan
Lives and works in: Melbourne, Australia.
Contemporarty™: Tell us how you discovered your passion for contemporary jewellery.
Joanne: I’ve always had a great passion for fine arts and crafts. At a very young age, I started to learn drawing and painting and was accepted into a specialized Art and Design school during my high school period in Taiwan. It was there that I picked up many skills and design tools that would enable me to practice with any media and medium in the field of fine arts.
C: Who or what inspires you?
J: To further my education, my family immigrated to Australia, and that’s when my perspective greatly opened up as I encountered different cultures and sub-cultures. In 2007, after I graduated from Monash University, I decided to develop more in contemporary jewelry in Europe (ALCHIMIA, ITALY). Traveling and contact with different people from different background is what inspires me, and I believe this is reflected in all my art works and jewelry.
C: How do you start creating a piece? By drawing, working directly with the material or do you have another approach?
J: I always play with different a material and start to transform it to express what I want and I also make molds to make sure that they look accurate.
C: You work a lot with PVC. What attracts you to this material?
J: I always think that serious critic from society and social influences result to the complexity of human interaction. People determine what is right or wrong; we cover ourselves up because of the value other people put on us. I, therefore, hope the audience will be able to discover the other parts that I opted to cover.
I start by using flexible material (PVC sheet) to construct a solid geometric form and it creates the following contradiction. It seems solid and heavy, but is physically light and pliable. Black colour expresses negative and hidden emotions. Bendable mesh sheet tingles people’s curiosity to see what is inside. The design of those pits on geometric form implies that there is life inside these pieces.
Thread symbolizes human relations; the connections and networks are similar to a hand sewing lines between the joint sections of various areas.
C: Which piece is the most representative of your work?
J: The above piece form the series ‘Cover & Discover’ represents me the most. The idea behind this series is that we always hide behind our identities and behind eachother even when you are trying to reveal a person’s real self just from their expressions. This is a topic of contradiction, so I used this idea to make this piece. In order to make a perfect hole on silver you have to be very precise. I then cut a PVC sheet and repeatedly sew the silk thread three times on each side.
C: What is the most indispensable item in your studio?
J: Paper and cardboard, because when I get an idea I use them right away to make a rough model.
C: What project are you working on now?
J: I still use PVC sheets, silk and silver to make new pieces but now I try to add some colours and also make the patterns more gentle and soft, because now I do not want to use such a ‘harsh’ point of view of this world. Maybe I’m just getting old…
C: Contemporary jewellery is…
J: I believe to entwine different cultures into jewelry is a way of carrying those cultures and memories with you, no matter where you are on this planet. So, I think contemporary jewellery is also a way of sharing those experiences with people.
Thank you Joanne for the insight in your work!
And people, don’t forget to visit NOI’s exhibition till 31.12.2011.