Imagination and virtual worlds

Beyond its value of utility , noble material - gold, silver, noble stones - has a lasting existence above all because of its symbolic power. In the field of jewellery, the classic range of materials has been expanded to include many natural materials and plastics that can be recharged. In jewellery, too, art, the old master of fiction, utopian design and thus virtuality, outlasts time: Ars longa - vita brevis. 

Meanwhile, it is not only physics that has long since abandoned the traditional notions of "solid" matter in dynamic cosmological models. The digital age is revolutionizing people's living conditions and, in particular, their social relations - probably to a greater extent than the invention of book printing at the beginning of the modern era.

Virtuality does not require proof of authenticity, nor real correspondence between material, form and colour. In view of these scenarios, which are also omnipresent, a longing for the authenticity of analog life, for a permanence and value grows, which materializes in the material and thus sensual presence of high-quality, identity-creating goods or in art.

Program:

• Searching for unity – modern physics and its explanation of the cosmos 
  Dr. Sibylle Anderl, astronomer and philosopher, Institute of Planetology and Astrophysics of Grenoble, FR
• Edelstein. Zur Kulturgeschichte einer Ikone (Lecture in German!)
  Wilhelm Lindemann, curator, Trier University of Applied Sciences, Campus Idar-Oberstein, DE
• My material
  Patricia Domingues, Rudy Faulkner, Eduardo Tarin and Elvira Golombosi: Master graduates of the Trier University of Applied Sciences, Campus Idar-Oberstein, DE
•  Understanding light through the art. Emeralds contribution to optical knowledge 
  Ph.D. Marjolijn Bol, postdoctoral researcher, Max-Planck-Institute for History of Science, Berlin, DE
• Goethe on colours. A vindication 
  Prof. Dr. Olaf Müller, professor for natural philosophy and scientific theory, Humboldt-University Berlin, DE
• Digital nature. Contemporary material aesthetics in face of virtual mediality 
  Dr. Niklas Hebing, Hegel Archives, Ruhr University Bochum, DE
• Cold shining – empty glamour. On Jeff Koon’s ‘Celebration Series’ 
  Prof. Dr. Regine Prange, professor for art history at the Art History Institute at the Goethe University, Frankfurt/Main, DE
• The art of stone cutting. The collection of the art chamber of KHM Vienna 
  Mag. Paulus Rainer, Deputy Director of the art chamber and treasury of the KHM - Museum of Art History, Vienna, AT
• REACT REACT REACT
  Silvia Weidenbach, Jewellery artist, UK

The process of globalisation in all areas of life, accompanied by the escalation of economic and ecological crises, technological innovations taking place in ever faster succession, a hardly manageable supply of information and communication have led to a growing need for leisure and contemplation on the part of many people - in addition to a feeling of being overtaxed. They are regarded by many people as a source of a regained art of living. The contemplative life design opens the senses for aesthetic experience and creativity. For some it has become the gateway to a new spirituality.

ThinkingJewellery X puts the contemplative concept of life to the test. Does it lead to a retreat into the private sphere and a rejection of social responsibility - or can it become a source of strength for creativity and worldliness in the sense of an argument for a peaceful policy based on mindfulness and sustainability?

Programm:

• Aesthetic experience and the good life
  Prof. Dr. Ursula Brandstätter, Musicologist, rector of the Anton Bruckner Private University Linz, AT
• Philosophy – Art – Life
  Prof. Dr. Julian Nida Rümelin, Professor of Philosophy at the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, DE, former Minister of Culture
• The metaphorical ornament: philosophy and way of working 
  Prof. Dr. David Huycke, Jewellery artist, professor of Jewellery Design at the MAD-faculty of the University of Hasselt, BE
• A vision of homo economicus to homo aestheticus
  Prof. Dr. Gisela Dischner, German Studies and author, emeritus professor of Modern Literature at the University of Hannover, DE
• The truth of the moment – on the relationship between attention and art
  Prof. Dr. Yuka Nakamura, Psychologist, lecturer in Development and Health Psychology in the Vice President's education and research dept. of the Zurich University of Teacher Education
• Bridging the divide: an exploration of collaboration through making
  Sarah Rhodes, PhD researcher at Central Saint Martins, University of the Arts London, UK
• Aesthetic economy – theory and applications
  Prof. Gernot Böhme, Emeritus professor of Philosophy at the Technical University of Darmstadt, director of the Institute for the Practice of Philosophy (IPPh)
• Worthwile
  Prof. Ute Eitzenhöfer, Jewellery artist, professor of Gemstone Design, Trier University of Applied Sciences, Campus Idar-Oberstein

The need for adornment and jewellery has accompanied mankind as an anthropological constant from the very beginning. As an important cultural asset, jewellery is reinterpreted time and again in all eras. The age of postmodernism is for many an apocalyptic complex of crises: ecological crisis, financial crisis, crisis of justice. In the age of globalization and social division, politics increasingly appears to be incapable of action, despite all the conjurations of the lack of alternatives to one's own actions. At the same time - not only in fashion or advertising - a new regime of the aestheticization of everyday life is emerging, at the end of which the self-presentation of the individual in the net takes the place of real relationships. SchmuckDenken 9 gathers - under consideration of jewellery - exemplary analyses and discusses perspectives for action under the aspect of ethical premises.

Program:

• „We’re like diamonds in the sky“ (Rihanna) - The addiction to luxury
  Wilhelm Lindemann, Author
• The currency of jewellery, gold and gemstones
  Prof. Dr. Christina von Braun, Professor of Cultural Theory (with primary focus on gender and history) at the Institute of Cultural Sciences of the Humboldt University of Berlin
• In the area of conflict between globalized haute couture and poverty – the ‘Sapeurs’ from the Republic of Congo
  Prof. Dr. Alexandra Karentzos, Professor of Art and Cultural Studies, Institute of General and Vocational Pedagogy of the Technical University of Darmstadt, DE – Wella chair of Fashion and Aesthetics
• Dieter Lorenz – Portrait of the artist
  Dieter Lorenz, Gemstone Designer in conversation with Wilhelm Lindemann
• Stinking rich – on conspicuous consumption,
  Prof. Dr. Birger Priddat, Professor of Political Economy, Faculty of Economics at the University of Witten/Herdecke, DE
• Different lives in one world – Cultural diversity or global design,
  Prof. Dr. Christoph Antweiler, Professor of Southeast Asian Studies, Institute of Oriental and Asian Studies of the Rhenish Friedrich- Wilhelm University of Bonn, DE
• Growth,
  Dr. Marjan Unger, Art Historian and Publicist, Bussum, NL
• Golden Years - From the Light of Delft to the Sparkle of the Dolomites 
  Robert Smit, Jewellery Artist), Amsterdam, NL

The 8th edition of ThinkingJewellery critically deals with the responsibility of art in a world that is endangered by the human being and the ideology of unlimited growth. Once again, it is focussed on the role of the jewellery artist within the society and his responsibility. Besides this ethical question it also deals with the question if art and aesthetic experi- ence will promote the process of the scientific perception and interpretation of the world and which role the traditional materials of jewellery art, gold and gemstones play or can possibly play within this context.

Programme:

• Prologue
  Prof. Theo Smeets, Trier University of Applied Sciences, Dept. of Gemstone and Jewellery Design, Idar-Obertein, DE

• Thinking Materials – Forming Ideas
  Prof. Dr. Jivan Astfalck, Director of School of Jewellery, Birmingham Institute of Arts and Design, Birmingham City University, Brimingham, UK

• About the metaphor of growth – tour through an exhibition project
  Dr. Holger Kube Ventura, Director of the Kunstverein Frankfurt/Main, DE

• About the metaphor of growth – performance
  Armin Chodzinski, Performance Artist) Hamburg, DE

• The near mirror – Philosophy and Art in the 20th century 
  Prof. Dr. Uwe Voigt, Philosopher, Professor for Analytical Philosophy and Philosophy of Science, University Augsburg, DE

• The double gold. The birth of money from the spirit of jewellery.
  Dr. Pravu Mazumdar, Philosopher, Munich, DE

• On the iconography of gemstones
  Wilhelm Lindemann, Curator of the city of Idar-Oberstein, DE

• Daniel Kruger: Vita and Work 
  Prof. Daniel Kruger, Professor for Jewellery Design, HdK Burg Giebichenstein, Halle, DE

The 7th ‘SchmuckDenken’ will strike a balance between the symposia to date and identify the initial contours of a theory of jewellery.

At the same time, possible parameters for strategies for action for an autonomous creative practice of applied art in the conflicting demands of craft, design and fine art will be developed. As a result, the focus this year will be on the artistic identity of jewellery creators and their social role and responsibility.

A book ‘ThinkingJewellery - A theory of jewellery’ will be published by the ARNOLDSCHE Verlagsanstalt Stuttgart to mark the 7th colloquium. The book includes a selection of articles from the years 2005-2010 and also contains around 100 illustrations of works of students and graduates which provide an appraisal of the current situation of the field of study of Precious Stone and Jewellery Design.

Programme:

• Prologue, 'Thinking Jewellery 2005-2011: On the way to developing a theory of jewellery’
  Wilhelm Lindemann, chairman, Idar-Oberstein, DE

• The masquerades of identity – on the costume art of Leigh Bowery
  Prof. Dr. Gunnar Schmidt, Professor of Theory and Practice of Intermedia Design at the Trier University of Applied Sciences, Trier,. DE

• Jewellery artist in the GDR
  Uta Feiler, Jewellery artist, Erfurt, DE

• Jewellery in context
  Dr. Marjan Unger, art historian and publicist Bussum, NL

• Impact of Signs and Design Ethics 
  Prof. PD Dr. habil. Angelika Karger, Professor of design theory, University of applied Sciences, Schwäbisch Gmünd, DE, and assistant professor of sciences, University Stuttgart, DE

• Applied uncertainty, a doubt in process 
  Gemma Draper, Jewellery artist, Barcelona, ES

• The jewellery of beauty and the beauty of jewellery
  Prof. Dr. Martin Seel, Professor of Philosophy at the Johann Wolfgang Goethe-University, Frankfurt/Main, DE.

• Modern tool or ancient medicine? Thoughts on being a jeweller 
  Prof. Theo Smeets, Professor of Jewellery Design, Department of Gemstones and Jewellery, Trier University of Applied Sciences, Idar-Oberstein, DE

This year the 6th colloquium deals with the all-embracing tendencies
towards globalization, which operate at every level – economic, political and cultural. The focus is on the cultural and artistic global interdependencies of the past and present and also considers their effects on jewellery. In the process, the theme will be exemplified in detail, taking art in the Islamic world as an example.

Program:

• Pure Decoration? Objects of Islamic art in context
  Prof. Dr. Stefan Weber, Director of the Museum of Islamic Art, Berlin, DE
• Many places later
  Iris Eichenberg, Head of the Metalsmithing Department at Cranbrook Academy of Art, Bloomfield Hills, USA
• A Big World Getting Smaller – presenting 3 projects’
  Estela Saez Vilanova on: ‘Walking the Gray Area’;
  Dana Hakim on: ‘I Care A Lot’;
  Marieke van Diepen on: ‘Athometown’
• Jewellery from the Orient
  Dr. Wolf-Dieter Seiwert, ethnologist, former research associate at the Museum of Ethnology, Leipzig, DE
• How the agate reached the Tuareg. A journey from three continents to a Sahara oasis’,
  Prof. Dr. Gerd Spittler, Professor of ethnology at the University of Bayreuth
• Modern art from an Islamic point of view or “modern Islamic art”? - A short overview
  Prof. Dr. Silvia Naef, Professor of history of art in the Arab world, University of Geneva, CH, president of the European Union of Arabists and Islamicists, UEAI
• duodji and globalisation
  Prof. Dr. Gunvor Guttorm, Professor of Duodji (Sámi arts and crafts, traditional art, applied art) at the Sámi University in Guovdageaidnu/Kautokeino, 
• European gems
  Prof. Dr. Gerard Unger, Professor of typography at the University of Leiden NL

‘Schmuck-Denken 2009’ places the focus on jewellery as an object. Jewellery can be many things: It definitely comes under the category of loved objects (Habermas), with which their owner develops a very personal relationship. As a personal object which is a part of the character of its wearer, it supports him or her in their self-development and the profiling of their personality, both internally and externally. Sometimes jewellery becomes a fetish, thereby even acquiring its own power to act. At all events, jewellery can be described as an attribute. Jewellery in the sense of an attribute raises the question of identification. Marjan Unger reflects the theories of Allison Lurie when she writes: ‘I don’t wish to place too much emphasis on the point that ‘jewellery’ behaves like ‘language’, but rather that it contains a language. The vocabulary would be the types of jewellery, supplemented by the symbolism of the forms, colours, motifs and any other references. The grammar would be how and when jewellery is worn and also who owns what pieces and who does not. In short: how people interact with jewellery.’

Programme:

• Prologue
  Wilhelm Lindemann, Chairman, Idar-Oberstein, DE

• On the product-aesthetic education of human beings
  Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Ullrich, professor of art history and media theory at the University of Arts and Design, Karlsruhe, DE

• West African fetish cult and European fetishism’)
  Prof. Dr. Karl-Heinz Kohl, professor at the Institute for Historical Ethnology, Johann Wolfgang Goethe University, Frankfurt, DE

• Assignments – post from heaven
  Truike Verdegaal, Jewellery Artist, Amsterdam, NL

• Diamonds are a girl's best friend – on the psychology of jewellery
  Prof. Dr. Tilmann Habermas, professor at the Institute for Psychology, area of study psychoanalysis, at the Johann Wolfgang Goethe University, Frankfurt/Main, DE

• The magic object in modernity. An anthropological con- stant?
  Dr. Viola Altrichter, cultural sociologist, Berlin, DE

• Reading jewellery
  Drs. Liesbeth den Besten MA, Art Historian, Chairwoman of the Françoise van den Bosch Foundation, Amsterdam, NL

• Temptation“ (English)
  Drs. Marjan Unger, Art Historian and Publicist, Bussum, NL

In 2008, our 4th Symposium is dedicated to the ornament. Is jewellery per se decorating? Are there contemporary ornamental means of expression? What is their social context? Scientist and artists are discussing these controversial questions about the influences of the ornament on jewellery and society.

Programme:

• Prologue
  Wilhelm Lindemann, Chairman, Idar-Oberstein, DE

• especially bananas: the ornament according to Adolf Loos or the evolution of culture
  Dr. Christina Threuter, Art Sciencist, Trier University, DE

• Gijs Bakker and the ornament
  Gijs Bakker, Designer, Amsterdam, NL

• Beuys’ social sculptures)
  Johannes Stüttgen, Artist, Düsseldorf

• a critical theory on ornament
  Prof. Dr. Burghard Schmidt, professor of language and aesthetics – University of Art, Offenbach, DE

• “since beauty is nothing but the beginning of the terrifying“ (Rilke) – Notes on symmetry and the breaking of symmetry in cognition and aesthetics
  Prof. Dr. Helmut Neunzert, em. Professor of Mathematics, Technical University Kaiserslautern, Kaiserslautern, DE, Fraunhofer ITWM, Kaiserslautern, DE

• “those nice manners in fact ruin the beautiful melody“ Ornamentals and style in 18th century music
  Prof. Reinhard Bahr, Professor for Ornamentation at the University of Music and Theatre Hamburg, DE

• is jewellery art?)
  Peter Egli, artist and author, Bern, CH

• Jewellery. To be
  Lin Cheung, artist, London, UK

• My longing for the market of Samarkand
  Marjan Unger, art historician, Sandberg-Institut, Amsterdam, NL

The 3rd colloquium “Schmuck-Denken” 2007 is still in search of a jewellery theory with the focus on the complex relationship between beauty and uniformity. As an element of pursuing acceptance, jewellery can become a tool of conformity. It also can become an instrument of non-conformity when it is used as a provocative attempt to separate oneself from society. On the other hand, it is conformist, in the case of the jewellery demonstrating an affiliation to a sub-cultural group.

Program

• The mystery of beauty
  Lucy Sarneel, jewellery artist, Amsterdam, NL
• Against method constraint in applied arts
  Bernhard Schobinger, jewellery artist, Zürich, CH
• About the Usefulness and Disadvantages of Adornment in Life” or: “Vive la difference! The Psychology of Jewellery
  Prof. Dr. Winfried Menninghaus, Peter Szondi-Institute for Literature and comparative Literature, FU University Berlin
• pimp me up! Accessories and Jewellery in Youth Culture”
  Prof. Dr. Birgit Richard & Jan Grünwald (M.A.), Department for Art Pedagogy, JWG University Frankfurt/Main, DE
• Headdress – a Theory about a Theory of Jewellery]
  Dr. Uwe Voigt, philosopher, University Bamberg, DE
• Beauty – the last taboo in jewellery?
  Manuel Vilhena, jewellery artist, London, UK
• Silence
  Iris Bodemer, jewellery artist, Pforzheim, DE
• Love-Affair – love and fear in jewellery
  Kadri Mälk, artist and head of the Jewellery Department at the Estonian Academy of Arts, Tallinn, EE