reference, she writes, to the opaque black stone used by Victorians
for mourning jewelry. But rather than repurposing jet for modern
use or echoing historical forms, Brooks has succumbed to the mate-
rial’s inherent charms. She massed the modest stones in an exuber-
ant mound, and between each she placed little diamonds and crystals,
scattered like confetti.
Then, tacking ornament onto ornament, Brooks cut into the jet
itself and implanted silver studs. In a statement, she described the
elements as dramatis personae and the brooch as the theater. Jet’s
“dark sobriety almost mocks the garish sparkle of the quartz and
diamonds, yet even it is foiled by the rash of cut steel scattered upon
its surfaces.” As we stare into the black of this modern-day curiosi-
ty—an irresistible and freakish amalgamation of too much “bling”—
the work seems to tell us that possession is the disease and the cure
at once.
How long can studio jewelers remain at a purely critical distance
from an art that has forever been a shameless celebration of wealth
and excess? In a 2004 statement Brooks wrote, “It is a simple matter
to question material hierarchies.
.. but how does one subvert the
status of a material without blatant disregard for what is also intrin-
sically desirable?” She is fascinated with the enduring power of
jewels, the legend of the mesmerizing yet lethal Spoonmaker dia-
mond, for example; “tales of jewelry, beauty and desire and seduc-
tion and love and death” weigh heavily on Brooks’s mind. Meta-
phors for the irrational pull of mankind’s desires, the paradoxes that
Brooks seeks in jewelry are likewise inextricable from who she is
as a maker.
Even the tattoos on her body invoke a passionate hyperbole.
On her left shoulder is a classic scene of a
vanitas
, inked by Andrea
Elston: an owl, a mirror and a human skull form a triangle of vanity,
death and wisdom. At the skull’s base, pearls are scattered, and a
rose graces its forehead. On a scroll below are the words
memento
homo quides, et quis eris
(remember man what thou art and what
thou shall become). On Brooks’s right arm, Virginia Elwood from
NYAdomedhas, over the years, tattooed shapes that recur in the
jewelry: diamonds, rosebuds and a ribbon tied perfectly in a bow.
On her upper arm, another tattoo artist has given her a crown of
thorns, and on the shoulder, a swollen heart with a knife through
it bleeds indefinitely.
Brooks’s apartment on Canal Street in Manhattan, decorated in
a dramatic vintage style, is a part-time studio, a curiosity cabinet for
her worldly possessions and a fishbowl for her anxieties about the >
Opposite:
ivory & roses,
2009,
brooch, stainless steel,
vintage ivory roses, vin-
tage rhinestones, 14k
gold, 3 9/io x 39/io x 3V3
in.
Long-sleeve tattoo by
Virginia Elwood.
Right:
ivoryrases,
2008, brooch,
stainless steel, vintage
ivory roses, 18k gold,
3'/» x 31/« x
2'/s
in.
Ноги long can Studio jew elers rem ain a t a purely
critica l distance fro m an a rt Shat has fo re v e r been
a Shameless celebration o f w ealth a n d excess?
fcb/m ario
american craft 057
www.journal-plaza.net & www.freedowns.net
