As a continuation of SNAG’s 50th Anniversary celebrations, this exhibition paid homage to our past and looked ahead to our future.
June 23-July 24, 2021 at The InLiquid Gallery, Philadelphia, PA.
The first SNAG exhibition, Goldsmith ‘70, was held in 1970 and was curated by Stanley Lechtzin and John Prip. It took place at the Minnesota Museum of Art in Minneapolis and highlighted the proficiency of an art form (jewelry and metal vessels) that more or less began after World War II and was, at that time, found to be maturing to the point of being ready for a museum exhibition.
To quote Stanley Lechtzin from his curator’s statement:
“The high level of technical competence displayed by most of the entered work was pleasantly surprising and encouraging. As recently as five years ago, this degree of skill was not common in American metalsmithing. This can be directly attributed, I feel, to the numerous excellent metalsmithing and jewelry programs presently being offered in the universities and colleges. The young craftsman today is being exposed to tools and techniques which were not available to his predecessors. It is apparent that a tradition of excellence is developing.”
Goldsmith ‘20 was a nod in the direction of our predecessors, with a modern twist.
SNAG members were invited to look at the pieces and makers that were in the original exhibition to influence their own creation.
A copy of the original Goldsmith ’70 exhibition catalog can be found here.
You can also click here to see images and descriptions of all the pieces from the catalog, located in the American Craft Council Library & Archives Digital Collection.
Unfortunately, the original catalog does not have images of every piece in the exhibition.
Even though the titles of both of the exhibitions include the word Goldsmith, the first had very little gold, and makers were invited to create pieces out of any materials they chose for the Goldsmith ’20 exhibition.
To quote John Prip from his curator’s statement written in 1970:
“…we must be aware of the large number of young people currently choosing metalsmithing as their life work. We are just beginning to hear from them.”
ABOUT THE JURORS:
Dominique Bereiter has been serving as a SNAG board member since 2015. She was trained as a neuroscientist and worked in this field for 25 years (in Switzerland and the US). While working in science, she took numerous classes at the Rhode Island School of Design and other art centers. In 2006 she changed her focus from medical research to art, set up a studio and immersed herself in designing and making jewelry. In 2014 she was the juror for Jewelry in the Uptown Art Fair in Minneapolis. Since 2016 she has been on the Studio Program Advisory Committee at Stout University. She is also a collector and supporter of the arts.
.
.
Eleanor Moty is Professor Emerita, University of Wisconsin, Madison, where she taught jewelry and metalsmithing from 1972 to 2001. She has been a member of SNAG since 1970, was one of nine presenters at the first SNAG conference in St. Paul, MN and exhibited work in the Goldsmith 70 juried exhibition.
For more than five decades her work has been exhibited in museums and galleries and is included in private and museum collections. Among them are:
- Boston Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA
- The Hermitage State Museum, St. Petersburg, Russia
- Houston Museum of Fine Arts, Helen Williams Drutt Collection, Houston, TX
- Pinakothek der Modern, Munich, Germany
- Philadelphia Art Museum, Philadelphia, PA
- Renwick Gallery of the Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, DC
.
.
Elizabeth Shypertt is a SNAG board member and co-founder of Velvet da Vinci art jewelry gallery in San Francisco. Over the 23 years of running the gallery, Elizabeth organized more than 80 exhibitions including one-person and group shows. Since leaving the gallery, Elizabeth has curated jewelry shows for the Petaluma Arts Center, the Center for Enamel Arts, Shibumi Gallery in Berkeley, and most recently, an exhibition of SNAG Lifetime Achievement Award Winner, Tex Gieling, for the Museum of Craft and Design in San Francisco.
| Date | June 23-July 24, 2021 |
| Location | InLiquid Gallery, Philadelphia, PA |
| Host | SNAG |