The popular perception of jewelry is that it needs to be made of materials like precious metals, diamonds, and gems. It should sparkle and be beautiful.
What happens when I play with this perception: If I change the materiality? The classic way of setting? What if I change the material being set? Will it still be quickly recognized as jewlery?
To examine these questions, I used familiar structures and shapes from the world of fine jewelry, such as chatons and rings with multi-stone settings, and instead of setting stones in those structures, I set the structures themselves in a chunk of epoxy. The resulting objects shimmer with a familiar blueish hue which simulates a glinting gem with the purpose of easing the brain into accepting the objects as fine jewelry.
I also further examined the result of replacing traditional setting techniques by setting gems in expoy, making them appear to be floating in space while still maintaining the familiar appearance.
These new settings provide a new point of view about the relationship between the stone and the setting, between the stone and the body and between the stone and tradition.
