Your First Time Is All the time Particular
It was every thing I imagined my first time could be like. Magical, full of surprises, and deeply satisfying. I’m speaking, in fact, about my first time attending Munich Jewellery Week.
What occurs when a gorgeous European metropolis will get was a up to date artwork jewellery field for every week? This city-wide occasion brings collectively artists, gallery homeowners, museum curators, collectors, college students, and jewellery followers from everywhere in the world. Listed here are the reveals that stood out for me—it’s certainly not an entire survey or best-of—and the jewellery I nonetheless get up desirous about.
Schmuck
The occasion that anchors every thing is the Schmuck particular exhibition held as a part of the large Internationale Handwerksmesse craft honest. The 2025 present was curated by Dr. Jurgita Ludavičiené, who selected 62 works by artists from 29 nations from an open name that acquired virtually 800 purposes.
The items I responded to probably the most all additionally occurred to utilize classic photos, utilizing these in visible satire that employed humor to ship incisive social commentary. For instance, Nanna Obel’s Simply Minimize It neckpiece explores the importance of hair as an emblem of magnificence and its affect on shallowness, id, and femininity. I used to be additionally an prompt fan of Geraldine Fenn’s jewellery, which makes use of classic painted miniatures as the bottom for narrative items in a sequence referred to as Colonial Comeuppance. Right here, Fenn reinterprets portrait jewellery, including silver, commerce beads, and, with nice outcomes, googly eyes to touch upon the European colonization of Africa.
And at last, Anna Davern’s diorama with a detachable brooch constituted of classic biscuit tins was a part of the Charlie’s Hunt sequence. The work is a collage of photos and symbols of the British monarchy juxtaposed with Australian natural world (together with invasive species launched by British colonists). Utilizing assemblage methods, Davern crafts a fantastical narrative of a comical fictional prince whereas questioning the affect of the British monarchy on Australia.
Pink & Punk, at Galerie Platina at Body
Alongside Schmuck, guests can see nonetheless extra jewellery on the a number of jewellery galleries that make up Body, within the again nook of the Internationale Handwerksmesse.
The Pink & Punk exhibit by Platina Gallery was notably enjoyable to go to. Items embodying the spirit of punk tradition, a few of them intentionally ignoring the temporary like Tim Carson’s this isn’t pink brooch, made this jewellery showcase a standout.
It’s all the time enjoyable to see how artists punk up the demure pearl. Each Hansel Tai’s pierced baroque pearl pendants and necklaces and Réka Lörincz’s YouandMe heart-shaped brooch constituted of sizzling pink tape and punctured with pearls had been edgy interpretations. Felieke van der Leest’s Boogie Woogie Flasher Hen had me ensnared the second I clapped my eyes on it. It was an important interpretation of one of many last taboos—flashing an onlooker—however completed with a lot humor that you’d like to have a drink with the artist and listen to the story. Van der Leest’s mixing of textiles, plastics, metals, and hilarity leads to work that sparks prompt pleasure. Which may be about probably the most punk factor you are able to do at present.
Der Berg: Therese Hilbert und Miriam Künzli
After the depth of seeing a lot work suddenly at Schmuck and Body, Therese Hilbert’s Der Berg exhibition was a psychological reduction from the overstimulation of bigger occasions. Right here, completely organized towards a white wall, had been Hilbert’s most up-to-date examples of her continued romance with nature. This time, she studied der berg (the mountain). Hilbert’s work is technically very good: austere, spare, summary. I may have spent a whole day meditating on these works fabricated from silver and wooden.
I used to be nonetheless desirous about the items once I got here throughout her Nase pendant from 1985 within the Danner Rotunda at Die Neue Sammlung (The Worldwide Design Museum). The formal austerity with an extremely excessive degree of craft—it was all already there. And to see that craftsmanship meticulously honed over 4 a long time appears like a privilege.
Peter Bauhuis: The Blüml Assortment
It was unimaginable to not have a little bit of a crush on Hans Blüml. His assortment of knickknack by Peter Bauhuis alone was loopy. The man clearly had style …
That is the world you get to drift about within the sensible thoughts of Peter Bauhuis. Greatest identified for his jewellery and steel objects, Bauhuis additionally finds artistic expression in conceiving exhibitions as art work. In Munich, Bauhuis revisits a favourite exhibition format – creating and displaying imaginary worlds as a Wunderkammer, or cupboard of curiosities.
Right here, Bauhuis conjures up Hans Blüml, artwork historian and collector. And Blüml was an astute collector … his assortment has Bauhuis’s biggest hits from the final 10 years, from the Oreichalkos rings (additionally in Schmuck) to his Fly pins and Flavedo brooches.
This stuff had been fantastically laid out on one facet of the gallery, balancing Bauhuis’ jewellery and small steel works together with his outsized Simultanea experiments within the different half. To make these outsized types, Bauhuis concurrently casts totally different metals to create astounding vessels from copper, silver, brass, and bronze. Unpredictability is essential to the method, and the cracks, holes, and fissures that emerge from totally different liquid metals colliding and melding are handled as a part of the design. The ultimate outcomes are a mesmerizing show of swirling patterns and contrasting colours.
O Lecko Mio, curated by Galerie Zink, exhibited at Artcurial
it’s going to be a enjoyable time simply from the exhibition title: O Lecko Mio (literal translation: lick me!). And then you definately stroll in and see 5 anatomically correct, muscly ox tongues full with life-like papillae.
Hyper-realism in artwork jewellery means David Bielander. Simply as you’re recovering from the shock {that a} materials as delicate as porcelain might be made to seem heavy and dense, you’re struck by an excellent instance of Bielander’s “cardboard” jewellery. In Bielander’s arms, silver transforms to appear like cardboard in his Crucifix.
Lisa Walker and Karl Fritsch (companions in life) had been the 2 jewelers alongside Bielander that made up the group of eight artists on this present curated by Galerie Zink. A dangling horizontal show of Fritsch’s rings sliced throughout the exhibition house. Fritsch makes use of conventional ring shapes like signet and cameo rings to show a few of his favourite aphorisms (I give up, Good, Ich weiss es nicht …) and pictures for our time (an individual in profile within the act of vomiting—explosively). The exhibition included a hoop from 1995 with 4 stacked cameos taking the place of the stone setting, demonstrating this exceptional maker’s means to riff on a theme for 30 years!
The present included Walker’s latest work from 2024 and 2025. Using unconventional supplies and daring types, she constantly challenges conventional notions of magnificence whereas making work that celebrates individuality and creativity. Combining wooden, paint, textiles, and beads, these designs reveal extra particulars the longer you take a look at them. Take Walker’s Larger Eyes and Wider Foreheads with Enticing Eyelashes, which is reversible. Right here, the again of the work has as a lot visible curiosity because the entrance, concealing a secret facet (or wearer’s pleasure) that solely the jeweler and wearer are in on.
Kill Your Darling, Benedict Haener at Galerie Wittenbrink
It was the day earlier than I used to be to depart from Munich, and I had checked Galerie Wittenbrink’s hours greater than as soon as to ensure I knew once they closed on that wet Sunday. Everybody had advised me this exhibition was to not be missed. And boy, had been they proper!
Haener’s sequence of necklaces, bracelets, and brooches are the images I’ve proven most to my non-jewelry pals, smugly asking, “Guess what it’s fabricated from!”
It’s unimaginable to take a look at Haener’s bitter candy-inspired jewellery and consider that it’s glass, resin, and diamonds and never fruit-flavored sugar and corn syrup. this as a result of your tongue begins tingling with anticipation on the hit of the bitter (apple or peach) taste that inevitably comes if you take a chunk of those candies with a cult-like following. Haener’s technical coaching in jewellery and product design mix to make these distinctive works that achieve difficult worth through the use of treasured supplies (“It’s diamonds!” I exclaim) to raise on a regular basis objects like drugstore sweet, sugar cubes, even sandpaper …
Conclusion
And so, with a suitcase weighed down by catalogs and perhaps just a few new finds, I bid Munich farewell.
In some ways, the up to date jewellery world is a paradox. Generally, it has a welcoming cohort of individuals, a lot of whom are beneficiant with sharing their data. I listened to insightful critiques, met legends, and skilled many moments of enjoyment over the course of the week. I attended exhibitions that had been brimming over with attendees, making me longing for the sector and rising makers. Then again, I heard multiple dialog fretting in regards to the want for brand new collectors, hand wringing in regards to the middle of the up to date artwork jewellery world shifting away from Europe, and the tough economics of gallery possession.
But regardless of issues about the way forward for up to date artwork jewellery, the joy and enthusiasm had been palpable. Work celebrated artistry and innovation, and underscored the resilience and creativity of latest jewelers whereas reminding us of the enchantment of knickknack as a type of private expression.
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