Monday, October 18, 2010

about 'circle & triangle'

The piece 'Circle and triangle' is a metaphor for the tensions between the human spirit and intellect.In Sufi philosophy, circles often depict spirit or spirituality, while the triangle symbolizes consciousness or awareness.
The 'circle' in this instance, becomes manifest or visible only when the elongated diamond shape (created by two adjacent triangles joined at their base), is placed under tension by hammer forming it around a mold...

'circle & triangle'

Sunday, October 10, 2010

Sustainability and the Gold Jewellery Industry in South Africa

The importance of education towards more sustainable practices

Currently, Jewellery Design and Manufacture education in South Africa has no or very little focus on matters of sustainability. This raises questions of ethical practices in this field, as sustainability deals with moral obligations towards society, the environment and the economy (Shearman, 1990). Product design has been in the limelight for a while and therefore rigorous changes have been made in both industry and education. However, the same cannot be said about Jewellery making education. It remains unaffected by this pertinent issue.

Even though gold is very easily recycled, according to statistics, the South African gold jewellery industry relies mostly on freshly mined gold. This seems rather disturbing in the sense that mining is such an environmentally hazardous industry; using large amounts of energy and yielding enormous mountains of toxic waste to produce a tiny amount of product. Each year hundreds of Jewellery Design and Manufacture students graduate, without any knowledge of the environmental impact of their decisions as jewellers.

Sustainable Education can breed awareness amongst future jewellers by teaching the ethical implications of the materials used i.e. the impact of mining and an awareness sources used. It is essential that this knowledge is followed by an understanding that there are other options and that there is a moral choice to be made.

As educators we were taught specific methodologies and we often follow these religiously without question or further study. Are we as design educators fully conscious of these processes, tools and materials? Have we taken an objective look at the processes we use? Do we adapt them to changing times and needs? Is it worth holding on to them if they are no longer relevant to the present times and situation?


Monday, August 23, 2010

'about knowing'

"The senses lose their place as gateways of knowing to take their rightful place as stimuli to action." (Dewey in Reconstruction in Philosophy, pg 83)

Knowing is a multi-tiered faculty and this nascent state has been represented in various ways. The piece below represents a triangulated model of knowing. It includes: knowing through sensory experience, knowing by engaging and knowing by being consumed. It also narrates the process of knowledge integration: consumption, digestion and assimilation...

'three levels'

Sunday, August 22, 2010

'the square as form'

All forms, whether considered static or dynamic, are in a continual state of change. When a form is manipulated, the physical shifts incurred establishes an open-ended narrative from which perpetual meanings can be extrapolated. The form, in Sufi philosophy, is representable by a square. This shape is a visual representation of the number 4, which corresponds on a macrocosmic level, to the four divisions of matter.

"many guises"

Monday, May 17, 2010

"Only what is separated may be properly joined". Carl Jung
One can only begin to comprehend the underlying complexities and meaning of a piece, after engaging in a process of ongoing and multiple analyses and creative reconstruction .

Friday, May 14, 2010

‘’Geometry deals with pure form, and philosophical geometry re-enacts the unfolding of each form out of a preceding one. It is a way by which the essential creative mystery is rendered visible. The passage from creation to procreation, from the unmanifest, pure formal idea to the ‘here-below’, the world that spins out from that original divine stroke, can be mapped out by Geometry...” (Lawlor, 1982: 10)