Contemporary Jewellery at Griffith Regional Art Gallery

Posted: 10 Nov 2011  |  By: John McPhee

In the 1970s, the towns and cities responsible for provincial art galleries around Australia began to realise the importance of their existing collections. Many galleries, such as the long-established Art Gallery of Ballarat and the Bendigo Art Gallery in Victoria, appointed professional directors, renovated their display spaces and instigated revived acquisition and exhibition programs.

At the same time, cities and towns without an art gallery began to consider the value of cultural facilities for the local population as well as the newly developing idea of cultural tourism. A rash of new art galleries sprang up around Australia, some in purpose-built buildings, many in no longer useful council buildings, old movie theatres, even hospitals. Many of these flourished and eventually developed into fully professional art galleries. Many stagnated, without much purpose or funding, and became all too often bleak exhibition spaces for the local art societies and an occasional touring exhibition.

A number of these galleries established specialised collections. The oldest regional gallery in New South Wales, the Wagga Wagga Art Gallery prides itself in Australia’s most significant collection of contemporary studio glass. At the Shepparton Art Gallery, an attempt to form a similar collection of contemporary ceramics has been derailed by a shift to painting as a supposedly more prestigious and popular art form. Keeping true to a collection policy, especially a less popular medium, is not always plain sailing.

The Griffith Regional Art Gallery is a good example of a local population creating a demand for an art gallery. The gallery, established in 1983, currently occupies half of a building known as the War Memorial building, built in 1939. The other half contains a war memorial display. Like many similar galleries, the staff work hard to maintain an exhibition program, developing their own exhibitions and displaying touring exhibitions from a variety of sources.

In 1988, the gallery made the decision to specialise in the collection of contemporary Australian jewellery. Sponsored by the Griffith City Council, the National Contemporary Jewellery Award is held biennially and the collection developed through purchases from that exhibition. The collection currently consists of fifty-five examples of work by some of Australia’s leading jewellers. While modest in its beginnings, the gallery aims for the collection and the award to become “a forum for discussion and debate and an opportunity to show a regional audience the groundbreaking and sometimes challenging work of Australia’s contemporary jewellers”.

The first works acquired for the collection were purchased in 1988 and exemplified some of the best contemporary jewellery of the time. Bronwyn Goss’s Moonlight spiral brooch and Marian Hosking’s Long curved brooch were both made in silver and continued a long tradition of obvious fine craftsmanship. Sieglinde Karl’s Body Marker, made with paper, photographs, crayon, string and sealing wax, was a much more challenging object.

It is interesting to see that this purchase did not scare the horses and in 1992 another example of Karl’s highly original approach to jewellery making was acquired. A bangle made from Tasmanian native myrtle wood, with a poem by fellow Tasmanian Hazel Smith burnt into it, is one of the masterpieces of the collection. Similarly confronting for those who think of jewellery as polite and pretty are works by Peter Tully and Pierre Cavalan which are anything but delicate and demand considerable commitment on behalf of the wearer. Tully’s Gay and Proud brooch was made in 1992, the year in which he died from AIDS. Like much contemporary jewellery, it has a political and social message as well as being a highly personal object to wear. Cavalan’s work, made as a sort of collage of found objects — mostly things such as souvenir spoons — treads carefully around good taste and kitsch and equally demands considerable commitment on behalf of the wearer.

Almost inevitably collections of contemporary jewellery focus on that which is precious and finely made. The Griffith collection is no exception. Of the fifty-five works currently making up the collection, most would be best described as examples of traditional gold and silversmithing and jewellery making. There are beautiful examples of fine work by Carlier Makigawa, David Walker and Johannes Kuhnen. Some, like the examples by Susan Cohn and Rowena Gough, are expertly made but make use of non-traditional materials such as anodised aluminium and vintage buttons.

More recent acquisitions have struck a balance between the fascinating use of non-traditional materials by artists such as Philomena Hali, whose Neckpiece and Bangle are made from recycled teabags, and work by artists including Kathryn Leopoldseder and Anne Warrener, who combine precious metals and natural materials and unexpected materials such as plastic swing tags. And those, like Christel van der Laan, whose work might be made of silver but look like plastic.

The future development of the collection depends on council and community support. A great start has been made and it is hoped that the collection will continue to grow and develop in unexpected ways, so that it fulfils the expressed wish to stimulate debate and interest in contemporary Australian jewellery.

Images from top:

Peter Tully, Brooch, Gay and Proud, brooch, paper, perspex, wire. Photograph Brett Naseby.

Carlier Makigawa, Building Brooch, stainless steel, papier-mâché, gold leaf. Photograph Brett Naseby.

Rowena Gough, Bandolier, mother-of-pearl buttons, steel, silver, gold plate. Photograph Brett Naseby.

Christel van der Laan, Brooch, Priceless, 18ct gold, polypropylene tags. Photograph Brett Naseby.

Bronwyn Goss, Brooch, Moonlight Spiral, sterling silver, diamonds. Photograph Brett Naseby.

Sieglinde Karl, Bangle, myrtle wood inscribed with a poem by Hazel Smith. Photograph Brett Naseby.

Click here for further information on Griffith Regional Art Gallery .