Total jewelry

According to one of determinations – jewellery is a mark on the body, which has not only an aesthetic value, but also defining the place of a person in the social hierarchy. For example, in the West Africa women still wear bijous made of golden coins. Such a “necklace” allows establishing the level of richness not that of a woman, but of a man from the first sight. The same matter, but in more secret form happens in the Western culture, mere here a man points his status not with the quantity of gold being worn by his wife or lover, but with the number of carats…

Nowadays the necessary attribute to the standard status symbols: Rolls-Royce, yacht or personal plane, is the Rolex or another watch of similar type and price. Really, you cannot enter a restaurant in your car or more, in plane, while a watch is the mark/symbol, which immediately defines your status in the society, though in sheer physical point-of-view of time measure it is less exact than a watch, which costs $100 … :)

The fact that a mark is very important in jewellery, is shown by the fact that companies of status jewellery (Chopard, Bulgari and other) latter their logos with big letters on the outside surface of a ring…

That is why one of representatives of the jewellery brands acknowledged the question of the magazine “J&W” why their actual production has become faceless, leaving the customers indifferent: “What can we do, if we live in times of the trade marks. THE MARK has become more important than creation itself …”

We were always interested in this expression of status/mark in jewellery, its codes and their decoding and search for the bounds of jewellery. You should agree that a yacht is really a symbol of status, and even some kind of bijou, but only a person of a very vivid imagination can call it jewel… : )

In real, the physical bounds of jewellery are determined by the human body, to be precise, by relation of body and jewellery (this relation was thoroughly explored yet in the second part of the XX century by Peter Scubick. In one of his project, while performing an operation, he sewed a jewel in hand – “hid” the jewellery inside his body, and during another exhibition he demonstrated the huge “bijous” of grotesque sizes, which a man literally entered…)

Though it is more difficult to determine the bounds of jewellery as of mark/symbol.

On the one hand, we may say that: “the non-wearing of jewellery is also jewellery”, some kind of “negative jewellery”, a sign that person denies the system of “marking” accepted by the society. On the other hand, the various subculture groups often create their own “marking” system, which becomes fashion and organically join the culture of consumers (for example, punks pins and other), when the subculture reaches the certain acknowledgment level. 

We can find many examples, when the entire groups of people wear certain jewels/marks. It is “clan” jewellery. One of the most distinct examples are the rings of the basketball, baseball or other games champions. Sometimes they even say not “we will try to win”, but “we will reach for the rings”. Also the State honors are attributed to the clan jewellery: the orders and medals. The exclusive feature of this jewellery is the fact that it is impossible (leastwise theoretically) to buy it. A person wearing the champion ring or medal shows that he has got up to the highest stage of the clan hierarchy…

As the status jewellery also the various notations, stripes, etc of the military ranks can be considered.

All of these things mean only the “part” jewellery, but not the all covering jewellery. In every at least minimally free society, not considering what “marking” systems are used, there is always freedom to choose and there will always be people, who will not want to be “marked” and will not allow “marking” them. Therefore, the total jewellery leastwise theoretically is possible only in the totalitarian country…

And then we remembered one of the darkest pages of history of the Western Europe – the concentration camps of the Nazi Germany and the Nazi concentration camp badges …(See Wikipedia) And though the concentration camps are not “invention” of the national-socialists, though there was created more horrible “archipelago GULAG” in the Soviet Union, the only Germans have introduced the rational and, no matter how horrible it would sound, – the “aesthetic” system of prisoners marking – the triangles, the system, according to which it was possible to identify a person in a moment, - the ideal “status jewellery”. And we thought: “what if…

So this project was born.

A project concerning the all covering – total jewellery, a project, which got out of bounds of jewellery, a project, which has become some kind of anti-Utopia, a test of beholder’s tolerance and political correctness.

But is it anti-Utopia? Don’t such the “marking” exist, even hidden? Don’t we put those even apparent triangles onto all persons we deal with, and the more onto those, whom we see on the TV or in the glamour magazines?

The exhibition is made of several parts:

• A box with examples of triangles (“not for sale. Sample only”) similar to those, which the firms send to the interested companies before starting the mass production. There are triangles and stripes of all colors and sizes in the box. As the additional advantage it is pointed that now, due to the new technologies, it is not necessary to sew the triangles down to the clothes, it’s enough just to press them with hot iron. (Information for snobs: This part of the project was awarded with the special award – Silver Spur for creative courage and uncompromising attitude at the “SCANDAL” contest).

• Paintings. According to the “spot painting” of Damien Hirst, the works are performed by the “triangle painting” technique.

• Short movie “Total jewelery” – the movie is shown only on www.

• On the big screen, with assistance of projector, the shifting “marked” XX century celebrities are shown every 4 seconds: politicians, scientists, artists and other.

• In a few monitors over 45000 (!) slides change every 0.2 seconds, in which the “triangled” celebrities, covers of the lifestyle magazines, various prestigious and consumption goods, logos of the companies, photos of the historical events are shown. (Such a large flow of fast shifting views load too much the optic foramen, a man is no more able to process the information and there arises a condition similar to trance.)

• Graphical works. (Combination technique: computer graphics, ink, acryl)

The theory of information states that “work of art is the object bearing an excess quantity of information”. Namely counterpoint makes a work interesting. Such the work makes a consumer (watcher, hearer, reader) to take an active part in the creative process. The edge of interpretation is the place, where a man (depending on his experience, education etc.) reveals the new meanings, allusions, layers and symbols of a work. Unfortunately, the mass media, especially television, made a man to be devourer of the superficial information with its flow of “digested” information. Consumer is used to receive the signals, not to analyze them. The value of these works depends only on you, the watchers. Will it be just ordinary “foolishness” or something more…

We have done our work. Interpretation is up to you.

Thank you for attention. 

This is the way the world ends 

This is the way the world ends 

This is the way the world ends 

Not with a bang but a whimper

(T.S.Eliot “The Hollow Men”)

P.S. We’d like to render special respect and thanks to Mi – Mi, the artists from Moscow, whose work “Frog can fly” has inspired and educated us.

So long and thanks for all the fish…: )