A Peek into the Assortment of Artist Geraldine Fenn

Geraldine Fenn was born on a diamond mine in Namibia, the place her father labored as an engineer for the De Beers diamond firm. At present, as a up to date jeweler and co-owner of Tinsel Gallery in South Africa, Fenn loves “the entire spectrum” of jewellery, from vintage to costume to modern.     

“Jewellery has a component of enthusiastic about and commenting on the world, and there’s a playfulness with supplies that I’ve at all times liked—something is honest recreation. I actually like that freedom,” she says.

Fenn’s work is impressed by every part from archeology to anatomical fashions, however she has a particular fondness for cameos and portrait miniatures. In 2025, she received the inaugural AJF Solo Exhibition Award, which acknowledged her collection of brooches that reinterpret historic portrait jewellery in silver and commerce beads. The ensuing solo exhibition, Dispatch from the Colonies, opens this week at Galerie Noel Guyomarc’h, in Montreal. Fenn’s work has additionally appeared twice within the Schmuck particular exhibition, the juried present in Munich that’s the premier occasion in modern jewellery.

“I’m an enormous sentimentalist in the case of jewellery,” she says. “I’m not good at drawing, so portraiture looks like this unimaginable talent, to seize the essence of an individual. And works in miniature—the technical problem—are much more superb to me. I really like that they have been doing this 2,000 years in the past. Romans have been carving shells.”

Tinsel Gallery, which is in Johannesburg, reveals the work of South African modern jewellery artists. The gallery, which Fenn runs along with her husband, jewellery maker Eric Loubser, celebrates its twentieth anniversary in 2026.   

Modern jewellery artist Samantha Vincent conquers the taboo topic of menstruation with this brooch. A base of white beads is mounted on an oxidized silver backing, a string of blue beads descending from it. “It’s nonetheless a topic that individuals are not comfy with, however I really like the truth that the brooch is a tampon,” Fenn says.

Vincent is basically self-taught in beadwork, a talent rooted within the conventional practices of Zulu craftspeople. The Zulus dwell within the South African province of KwaZulu-Natal, house to the Durban College of Expertise, the place Vincent is a lecturer within the jewellery design and manufacture program. The brooch is a part of a collection that pulls consideration to topics which might be usually invisible in public discourse.

“There’s a lengthy custom of beadwork in South Africa, however not many individuals are making modern jewellery with beadwork,” Fenn emphasizes.

This piece seems like a pair of earrings, however it’s, in truth, a brooch pin. The yellow balls atop the earring backs are hooked up to one another. The piece re-creates the best way many individuals lock their earrings collectively to retailer them.

“You not have a pair of earrings—you may’t undo them,” Cheung explains. The piece is a part of the collection Maintain, which explores how we retailer valuable gadgets. Cheung’s jewellery usually feedback on and reinvents acquainted jewellery norms to mirror on the that means and relevance of carrying jewellery immediately.

Cheung, who relies in London, is understood for her items carved from rose quartz, lapis lazuli, rock crystal, and different stones, in addition to a collection carved from freshwater pearls. She obtained the Herbert Hofmann Prize, thought of the best honor in modern jewellery, in 2018. Fenn loves the work’s spare magnificence and its commentary on jewellery.

This embroidered brooch—which is “like slightly pillow,” Fenn says—is sewn collectively like a patchwork. Its maker, Helen Clara Hemsley, usually makes use of threads and textile fragments that belonged to her mom, who died when she was a youngster, as a method of staying related to her.

The phrase “hectic” is embroidered on the brooch. “It’s a really South Africa factor—we are saying ‘hectic’ lots,” says Fenn.

Hemsley, who grew up in South Africa and now lives in Copenhagen, works largely with embroidery and located objects. Her neckpiece It Didn’t Work, introduced alongside a bit by artist Mette Saabye, was featured within the 2025 version of Schmuck.

Partly as a result of Fenn is fascinated by portraiture, one among her most prized possessions is a Nineteenth-century pendant that was handed right down to her by her mom’s household. The hand-painted portrait depicts a sandy-haired boy in a sailor’s shirt, his large blue eyes gazing out on the viewer. The boy died in childhood.

“I really like items like this as a result of they’re so intensely private and mawkish,” Fenn says. “The truth that it’s somebody I’m distantly associated to is so particular to me.” The again reveals the boy’s grave with a willow tree’s branches bowed over it, a basic motif of mourning jewellery. The tree is comprised of strands of hair.

Earlier than pictures grew to become ubiquitous, a portrait was treasured, particularly one you might carry with you. This pendant belonged to the boy’s mom.

The piece was an essential affect on Fenn’s brooch collection, Colonial Comeuppance, which options classic painted miniatures, largely of European ladies from the Nineteenth century.  

Fenn imagines them as colonialists who’ve come to Africa and at the moment are the topic of an African gaze. She hopes to spur viewers to consider colonialism and the talk concerning the restitution of cultural artifacts in lots of Western museum collections.

This ring was the primary piece that Loubser, Fenn’s husband, made for her after they started relationship. The ring opens like a locket. Its entrance depicts a face that’s primarily based on a Playmobil toy, with eyes made from inexperienced tourmaline and a mouth painted pink. Contained in the ring is a pink coronary heart surrounded by synthetic grass.

Loubser is a South African native whose work was included in Schmuck in 2023. The ring is an instance of his playful type. He enjoys tweaking standard tradition with items that convey a smile to 1’s face.

Fenn says she reserves the ring for particular events: “It’s fairly valuable to me.”

The opinions acknowledged right here don’t essentially categorical these of AJF.

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