A new exhibition at the Salon Art + Design fair in New York juxtaposes jewelry with ceramics to explore the idea of shelter in today’s uncertain world.
“Protection” is a collaboration between Sarah Narici, founder of New York fine-jewelry brand Dyne, and Berlin-based artist Kara Chin. The cousins have worked together in the past, but this project for the annual fair — which returns to the Park Avenue Armory from November 6 to 10 — is their first joint exhibition.
The display will feature 24 Dyne jewels that interpret one of three themes: the bud, the capsule-room and the ritual.
Safe havens
A closed flower bud is the central motif of a blackened-gold necklace with jadeite and emeralds, and a pair of blackened-gold bracelets. These pieces wrap around the neck and wrists like a form of enclosure. All three feature reverse-set white diamonds, alluding to something “a little bit spiky” to show toughness, according to Narici.
The capsule-room theme takes inspiration from Russian architect Galina Balashova’s designs for Soviet spacecraft interiors. Narici drew on depictions of these homelike spaces in her choice of pastel colors, setting the titanium and white-gold Sky Pod earrings with topaz, pale sapphires and diamonds.
“One of the things I thought was really interesting was that [Balashova] used very bright colors on the floors so that people in zero gravity could tell which way was up and which way was down,” says Narici. The jeweler references this in the Jadeira earrings and ring, which use jadeite and emerald to cushion larger central stones.
The most experimental Dyne piece is a lighter case of rose-gold-plated silver with sapphires and enamel. It’s a response to the theme of ritual — something “people do to feel as though they’re safe and protected” when feeling stressed, such as lighting candles, explains Narici.
Preserved in stone
The jewels will be on display alongside Chin’s wall-based stoneware designs. Drawing on the idea of precious gems encased in rocks, and fossils preserved in sediment, the ceramics feature a glazed image of a modern wellness space within a carved, organic frame. “They almost look as if they could be a stone that’s been prised open,” says Chin.
Chin sees caves and spaceships as “opposite ends” of time when it comes to preserving small, delicate objects. “Caves are the earliest evidence of human life, and I was juxtaposing those maps [of caves] with maps of space stations, and they have this strange similarity to them where it’s these capsule, pod-like spaces…that extend off [atria] in strange directions,” she elaborates.
Narici’s designs, in contrast, typically explore a tension between ancient history and the future.
The more, the merrier
Other participants at Salon Art + Design include US estate jeweler DK Farnum, which specializes in signed 20th-century pieces; Jerusalem-based brand Yvel, known for its use of pearls; London-based fine-jewelry brand Cora Sheibani; and family-run Portuguese house Rosior, which crafts one-of-a-kind jewels.
Brazilian designer Fernando Jorge is returning to the event for a second year, having opened his first US showroom in New York in the meantime. And London-based gallery Elisabetta Cipriani Wearable Art will be showing a range of work at the fair, including new pieces by American artist Michele Oka Doner.
Artist Kara Chin and Sarah Narici, founder of New York fine-jewelry brand Dyne. (Kara Chin/Dyne)
