AJF at Velvet da Vinci

In this month's newsletter you will find Part II of the AJF galleries listing. This time we will be featuring the North American galleries. As always, we would love to hear your reaction to this new addition to the newsletter, as well as any ideas you have about what we could do to keep you better informed about, and connected to, the contemporary jewelry world. Please pass along your thoughts to us at [email protected].

Based on feedback from the member survey we conducted several months ago, the AJF board has decided to organize a series of local events for our members in America and England. The first of these took place in San Francisco in mid-August 2011 with a reception at Velvet da Vinci gallery and free passes to the American Craft Council fair. Thank you Mike Holmes and Elizabeth Shypertt, directors of Velvet da Vinci, for your generosity. And here are some upcoming events you might like to attend:

• In late September, we turn our attention to London where the British Craft Council is presenting the Origin fair. Helen Carnac, an English AJF supporter and maker, has arranged for us to get VIP passes to this event. She has also offered to put together a day of it with the numerous events that are taking place around the same time, such as the Goldsmiths Fair, the London Design Festival and the exhibition Postmodernism: Style and Subversion 1970-1990 at the V&A. If you are interested in taking part, please email us at with London in the subject line.

• On the last weekend in October, Sienna Patti and Damian Skinner are planning to gather a group together from the Boston area to get a special tour of the Jewels, Gems, and Treasures: Ancient to Modern exhibition at the Museum of Fine Arts Boston. You can find out more about the exhibition by clicking here. The exhibition was curated by AJF member Yvonne Markowitz, and there is a wonderful catalog available as well. For more information on this event, please email us with Boston in the subject line.

• In November, Susan Cummins and Linda Peshkin will be organizing a dinner during the SOFA Chicago fair, which takes place from November 3-6, 2011. For more on that please email us with Chicago in the subject line.

• And finally . . . in December, in partnership with ASJRA, Susan

  Harry Bertoia

  Kempin and Elyse Karlin will be arranging a visit to the MAD exhibition curated by Jeannine Falino (the AJF speaker at the last NY SOFA) called Crafting Modernism: Midcentury American Art and Design. (To find out more about the exhibition, click here.) If you would like to attend, please email us with New York in the subject line.

AJF began as a way for people interested in contemporary jewelry to meet together and share their passion. The board believes in this goal, and we

hope these events - and others in the future - will enable all of us to tangibly express our commitment to the jewels and jewelers that have brought us together.

Susan Cummins

AJF Chair

Recently AJF Supporter Elise Winters gave part of her Polymer jewelry collection to the Racine Art Museum and they have organized an exhibition and catalog to mark this fabulous addition to their holdings. Click here.  

Help provide funding for the Museum of Arts and Design's educational programs and jewelry acquisitions by attending the LOOT sale in New York from October 11-14, 2011 and purchasing jewelry from the attending jewelers. There will be 52 artists represented, many of whom have never shown in New York before, are from outside the United States, or are recent Pratt graduates. AJF supporter Bryna Pomp is helping to organize two additional events for higher-level ticket purchasers: a panel discussion lead by Diane Venet, curator of From Picasso to Koons: The Artist as Jeweler; and a lecture by Lois Sherr Dubin on her recently published book Adornment: The Jewelry of Barbara Natoli Witt. Click here

A New Zealand project, linking new graduates with established mentors, gets an exhibition outing in Sydney. To learn more, click here. 

Gerd Rothmann has a large retrospective exhibition at the Goldsmiths House in Hanau, Germany. I Say Jewellery, But I Mean the Creative Process features 120 pieces made by Rothmann between 1967 and the present. You can find out more by clicking here. 

The Spirit of Stone event that took place in Lappeenranta, Finland, in early May 2011 gathered together students and teachers from European jewelry schools, as well as others interested in jewelry and stone. In addition to a symposium, the event also involved workshops, an exhibition and a jewelry art and design competition. Click to read more.

Overheard from a group of four women while visiting the Atelier Janiye and the Legacy of Master Jeweler Miye Matsukata exhibition at the Fuller Craft Museum in Brockton, Massachusetts.

'I was going to buy this one, but it is in a private collection.' 

SHOWTIME    

Limited growth and development of high-end craft fairs has happened at a time when art fairs are multiplying and increasing their importance and reach around the world. The Art Basel fair is the mothership of them all. Like a good mother, it has provided a supply of nutritious life force - collectors- to specific locations at specific times of year, which in turn has encouraged the development of baby fairs. Click to read more.