I was born and grew up in Beijing, the cultural and political center of China, where traditionally consider as the city of dragon and royalty, which is the symbolic representation of the supreme power and authority in society. The outstanding and magnificent history award and deliver this city a paramount spirit of adoration to power, authority and system, which formed and develop into the part of the great Chinese culture and history.
Politic is always playing a crucial role that dominate in daily life for every person living in Beijing, from the tops of the leadership in government to the basic-level cadres and civil servant working in the small unit, which deeply impact people to worship the political power and authority in institution. Oppositely, every individual might lose their value of freedom, dignity and independence in front of the authority, which leads to the structure is based on the surrounding of the power as central in society, unlike the western civilization that is depend on the foundation of justice, democracy, equality, and value of freedom in each individual. It makes me to think about the distinctive conflict and difference between eastern culture and western culture in the acknowledge of the value of the freedom in society. I was quite amazed by a quote stated by the Japanese fashion designer: Rei Kawakubo, who state that: “Am I an anarchist? In the sense that anarchy equals freedom, yes. Anarchy means freedom, but it also means chaos.” Her statement indicated me to explore the relationship between freedom and chaos in society, and their influence to the power and authority, which become the final theme of my jewelry collection.
Jewelry has been playing a significant character and appearance in the long history in human society from ancient age to modern era, which record and influence various perspective of the social and cultural development and change. The value of jewelry is expand to the many different mediums to express the imagination, emotion and passion of jewelry maker and wearer themselves, and established a exceptional connection between the jewelry and human. Specially, in the past few decades, the development of the contemporary jewelry has been emphasized the relationship between the jewelry object and its social function and expression of the human emotions, such as fear, pain, or anger, rather that focus on the attraction of its materialist value. Contemporary does not always aim to flatter. It also could be designed to push the limits of glamour, courting danger and reflecting the tension. One of the famous branch of this movement is the popular of political jewelry, which was developed from the honorable medals and royal crown in ancient era as political function to the political expression to the social issue by the adopted of jewelry object as medium. For example, the former United States Secretary of States: Madeleine Albright is well known for her fascinating passion n to collect the precious custom jewelry as her weapon and tool to defend the diplomatic right and deliver political message during the several significant event and position, such as the Gulf War, US ambassador in UN, or administration in White House, which also makes me have the aspiration to create my own political jewelry work as my senior show.
”Freedom & Chaos” collection is consist of five major pieces including the tank necklace, tank ring, star brooch, wall brooch and flag brooch. Each pieces not only have shared their common theme and perception in creative designing, using material, and basic craftsmanship, but also have preserved some unique aspects in wearing function, conceptual elements, and innovative making techniques, which only belongs to itself to become an ordinary individual piece in the entire collection.
The tank is a major object involved in the designing idea as reference. This is due to the “Freedom & Chaos” collection is chiefly inspired by the iconic democracy protest and evolutionary movement happened in Beijing in 1989 at Tiananmen Square. The student-led demonstration aims to processed the political reforms from one party system ruled by Chinese communist party to democratic institution, which also have the requirement of freedom speech and press, counter-corruption, and human right in society. Tragically, it finally results in the massacre to the protesting student in the Tiananamen Square by the people’s liberation army from Chinese government, which become one of the most prominent incident in 80s in Chinese history. During the site-clearing in the Tiananmen Square by dozens of military tanks, there was a remarkable image taken by a photographer, which shows a unknown brave man who was stand in front of the tank and tried to stop them to go through the square. On the one hand, the concept of a tank represents the authority of the government and system, which seems invincible but is challenged by the tank man, who heroically standing in front the authoritarian state. On the other hand, the spirit of the tank man finally become a symbol of freedom and chaos, which gives faith to those people who have the passion and believe in the value of individuals against the authority of system.
The designing of the tank necklace is inspired by the Art Deco jewelry style, which was popular during the time of post-war decade from 1920s to 1940s when jewelry became a symbol of the age of technology such as bicycle chain, ball-bearings, motor car engine. One of the most innovative creation was tank used in the battle fields of First World War in Europe, which design reflects the Art Deco have the characters of streaming line, bold geometric form and shape, sharp edge and linear appearance, settling of precious color stone or stylized decorative elements in jewelry. In order to express the movement of the mechanism invented in the tank, I chose to not only simplified the shape and form of every essential unit to incline into streaming line, such as rotate square and triangular structure arrow, but also add the smooth wall surface I was inspired by the wall pattern from the ancient building in Beijing that represent the solid system and authority.
The tank ring also has a similar basic elemental design with the tank necklace, which also succeed the wall pattern on the surface and minimised streaming line. The only change is the settling of the round yellow amber at the end of the ring, which I chose to rivet a cut tube go through the hole in the middle of the amber that could be rolled by finger technically to display the concept of Futurism art style, which emphasised the dynamism, speed, technology, and violence reflects in the tank. The double ring on the bottom is identified as the forceful vehicle wheels with well-developed engine from the tank.
The star brooch is motivated by the symbol and function of the red star medal commonly used as national patriotic jewelry to award the military soldiers in People’s liberation army who take the action and sacrifice their lives to prove their love and loyalty to the country. I chose to settle a inkjet print picture of the tank man covered by a star acrylic, which express my respect to those people who truly deserve the medal of patriotism.
Both the flag brooch and wall brooch is the experimental works of the deconstruction design that I intend to play the concept of different symbolic element of flag, such as hammer, star, and strip, or the figurative and organic component of diverse wall in brutalism architecture, such as concrete, doom, baluster, or the barbed wire, which is not only randomly deconstructed by me, also recombining the irregular shape of the wall pieces by soldering them together to form the new visual experience of the idea of wall. Each bricks in the wall is pinpoint as each individuals in system to form the wall, which seems stable and secure but will be push over by the people if possible in the future. Same as many historical events happened in the world, from the Berlin wall, Palestine border wall, to Mexican border wall.
In sum, I would like to conclude my article by using a short interview of the legend jeweler: Liesbeth Den Bosten, who was being asked the question of “What is jewellery?” She responses that: “For me, jewelry is fun, it’s ornaments, it’s color, is a expression, is a symbol, it can express political fields… it can express love, power. It’s about humankind. That’s jewelry! ” I was quite mood by her convincing answer to encourage all the young jewelry artist like me all over the world to chasing their dream and express their emotion, liberty, and freedom in jewelry world to initiating the social change in the future.
