The Best Of Australian Contemporary Jewellery At Griffith Regional Art Gallery

Griffith Regional Art Gallery hosts three concurrent exhibitions featuring the very best of Australian contemporary jewellery.

The Gallery’s own biennial exhibition - the National Contemporary Jewellery Award (NCJA) - features artworks by 25 of Australia’s finest contemporary jewellers, including the winning piece from Wagga-based artist Juanita McLauchlan, titled ‘dhurrin/green unripe’.

The piece, fashioned to be worn around the neck, features bush-dyed woollen blanket, possum fir and cotton thread.

Ms McLauchlan, who was present at the Gallery when the award was announced, said this is the first time she has entered into the NCJA and said the piece, which also features bracelets to represent each member of her family, represents her family and their bond with each other.

When speaking with the NCJA, one of the judges Dr Rohan Nicol from the University of Tasmania said the calibre and ambition of this award had continued to grow, drawing in over 80 entries from across Australia this year.

“This increasing level of participation speaks to the Award’s standing in the contemporary jewellery community and the role it plays in elevating contemporary jewellery practice nationally,” Dr Nicol said.

The NCJA exhibition will remain on display until Sunday, December 22, with selected pieces of the Gallery’s collection available for viewing all year round.

GEOMORPH, featuring works from Dr Sabine Pagan who trained as a jeweller and gemmologist in her native Switzerland before establishing an artistic career in Australia, is also on display at the Gallery.

This exhibition explores the value of materials in shaping our perception of, and connection to, our surroundings.

Melding the natural with the manmade, the works draw from the artist’s recent move to Tasmania and her background as a Swiss Australian.

GEOMORPH will also remain on display until Sunday, December 22.

The third exhibition, which the Gallery will host for the next two years, features works from the National Gallery of Australia (NGA) in Canberra as part of its Sharing the National Collection initiative.

This program will see precious artworks from the NGA being loaned to regional galleries all over Australia.

Griffith is hosting Treasure Trove - 50 Years of Jewellery from the NGA, featuring key pieces of contemporary jewellery from the NGA Collection, paired with Griffith’s own jewellery collection, presenting an overview of creative trends in the development of Australian contemporary jewellery over the past four to five decades.

The NGA’s coordinator of the Sharing the National Collection initiative, Leanne Santoro visited the Gallery to install the exhibition and attend the official opening.

“The collection Griffith is hosting features 41 works by 32 leading contemporary jewellers including some of the most important artists in our collection such as Robert Foster, Susan Cohn Frank Bauer, Peter Tully and Catherin Truman,” Ms Santoro said.

“There is a very wide range of materials used and techniques on display in these very special pieces.”

Gallery Coordinator Ray Wholohan said the Griffith Gallery was a public art gallery that had a unique and specialist collection of contemporary jewellery.

“We are honoured to partner with the National Gallery of Australia, the largest federal art museum in the country, to present our collection alongside highlights from the NGA collection,” Mr Wholohan said.

“The pieces - including brooches, rings, necklaces, pendants, bracelets and more were created by Australian artists from the 1970s to the 2010s.

“This suite of exhibitions, which we are calling Alchemy, a word used to describe turning ordinary metal into gold, provides visitors with a complete view of contemporary jewellery practice in Australia from 1970 until the present day.

“We are grateful for our partnership with the University of Tasmania’s School of Art and the National Gallery of Australia to make this extraordinary exhibition happen.”

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