NYC Jewelry Week Day 3

Hi,

Today was the AJF tour so now you will get jewelry, jewelry and nothing but jewelry with some people shots thrown in for a little variation.

We met at 9 am at the American Irish Historical Society on 5th avenue. It is an elegant old townhouse and it is set up for a breakfast and Helen Drutt organized an exhibition on the main floor of the work of Breon O'Casey called A World Unknown 1983 - 2003. Helen could not be there for this event that morning but her son Matthew, who is a well known curator was in attendance as well as Elizabeth Essner who is an independent curator and has assisted Helen in her pursuits. They presented the story of how Helen met Breon and how she ended up representing him in her gallery.
Here are some images of the breakfast and the work.

We went from the American Irish Historical Society across the street to the Met for an amazing show. I promised you yesterday that we would see this- remember?

Our guide was one of the curators, Beth Wees. There were 6 curators from different departments in the Met making suggestions for objects to be in the exhibition.

There was a huge variety of jewelry from cultures all over the world and from 4,000 BC to the present. Every conceivable material and use of adornment was covered. And everything in the show was part of the Met's jewelry collection except the pearl necklace.. funny that they wouldn't have that. Seems so common.

Ear Dart

They had a lovely and subtle way of showing parts of the body to remind the viewer that these objects were to be worn on the body.

Lalique is always great.

Now we get to contemporary work and these vials are filled with sperm.... yuck.

Old and new.

We had a lovely lunch in a private dining room arranged by one of the AJF members who also gives to the Met. It was a wonderful way to have lunch.

Now we are off to see the studio of Biba Shutz who is an American artist who is self taught and has a studio in the Diamond district of NYC. Everyone became very engaged in trying to decide what they wanted to buy.

This photo will make Rose shreek.

The next stop is a show put together by Sienna Patti and Mark McDonald. Mark is an expert in mid-century jewelry and so he picked 3 American women jewelers from the 1950s and Sienna picked 4 American women contemporary jewelers whose work seemed to play off of the older work. Raissa Bump and Rebekah Frank were among the grouping and where with us on the tour. This took place in a space in another mass marketing jewelry location in Manhattan called the Jewelry Library. It is a newly opened small location that will maintain a library and event space.