Images show people imbued with vivid material curiosity, delight, haptic knowledge, a spirit of humour and inventiveness…
Amanda Game
Amanda Game has enjoyed a thirty-five year career as an exhibition maker, curator and events producer with a specialist interest in supporting contemporary makers: their thinking and their objects.
A series of large banners currently line the streets of Glasgow reminding residents and visitors alike that ‘People Make Glasgow’. These words highlight the fact that Glasgow is a city built on making things – from ships to textiles – and celebrates the human skills, ideas and imagination that have shaped that over time.
Central to that story is The Glasgow School of Art (founded 1845) which remains, to this day, a significant powerhouse of human skill and imagination in different disciplinary contexts. Central to the School, from its inception, has been the Silversmithing and Jewellery Department devoted to the study, advancement and understanding of fine metalwork and modern jewellery.
The current Head of Department, Anna Gordon, and her four part-time tutor colleagues, Marianne Anderson, Andrew Lamb, Michael Pell and Silvia Weidenbach, show us, in their following texts, how firmly intertwined the School and Department are with the history and contemporary life of the City of Glasgow. They draw a picture of a vibrant city of music, (Glasgow became a UNESCO City of Music in 2008); sport; architecture; artists’ studios; museums and galleries; industrial heritage and innovation in science as well as art and design. They speak of the School as ‘a workshop’ of ideas, with strong European and international links reflected in their own professional lives. Three were born in Scotland (Anderson, Gordon, Lamb) one in Germany ,Weidenbach one in Australia (Pell); four now live in Glasgow full-time (Anderson, Lamb, Pell, Weidenbach) but all see Glasgow - both School and City - as a significant facet of their artistic development.
Each tutor has selected, in turn, two graduates of the Department to show alongside them. This both reveals something of their own aesthetic and technical interests while also demonstrating, in essence, the breadth of graduating talent from the Department.
Glasgow (population 620,000) is by modern standards a modestly scaled city and the School is a modestly scaled, independent, art school (students across all sectors approx… 3,500). This intimate scale offers something important to contemporary art education in the UK. The School benefits academically from being connected to Glasgow University – a leading Russell Group University (est. 1451) – as all GSA degrees are validated by the University. However, its independent status enables the GSA to focus on studio practice as its principal pedagogical tool to support learning and scholarship.
Studio practice benefits from a human scaled environment allowing for the key values of strong interpersonal exchange and hands on learning to flourish. Whether in disciplines such as architecture, graphics, sound, jewellery, textiles, painting, sculpture or environmental art The Glasgow School of Art thrives on this studio based culture of making.
The set of newly commissioned photographs by Alan McAteer of GSA staff from across the School, illustrated here, animates this human dimension of studio practice. The images show people imbued with vivid material curiosity, delight, haptic knowledge, a spirit of humour and inventiveness, all connected through the opportunity to wear, share and explore some of the innovative jewellery and metalwork coming out of the GSA.
This defining culture of making at the GSA may rest in the city’s industrial heritage but it is already pointing the way to its future and to our wider understanding of how people can make places in our global world. Perhaps the art of jewellery, as taught and understood at this exceptional School, is in some way the perfect discipline through which to understand that.
Marianne Anderson (b. 1978) has taught in the Department of Silversmithing and Jewellery at The Glasgow School of Art since 2008, first as a Visiting Tutor now as a part-time Lecturer. She is also a graduate of the School (2003) and has had her own independent practice in Glasgow for twenty years. Her striking jewellery in precious metals draws on a sustained interest in and study of the patterns of architectural metalwork and the built fabric of Glasgow and other European cities. Her work is actively exhibited and collected by both private and public collectors including the Goldsmiths Company London and Alice and Louis Koch Collection in the Swiss National Museum, Zurich.
Marianne was born in Paisley, a former centre of the textile weaving industry just a few miles West of Glasgow. She attributes her original fascination with pattern and structure to this textile heritage seen in collections such as Paisley Museum. From a young age she visited exhibitions and museums in Glasgow, recalling the 1999 City of Architecture and Design Festival with its active programme of exhibitions and events which Included celebrations of major Glasgow architects such as Alexander ‘Greek’ Thompson (1817–1885) and Charles Rennie Mackintosh (1868–1928).
She remembers her studies at the GSA as ‘hugely inspiring’ under the then Head of Department Roger Millar and tutor Jack Cunningham. The friendly and focussed environment encouraged independent thinking and the acquisition of strong material knowledge and skills. The Department also forged fruitful external links for students with visits organised to other European centres such as Munich and Geneva. The importance of a connection to the city and communities of Glasgow was also emphasised through a strong Open Doors policy to city residents fostered through the Annual Graduation Show and regular exhibitions and projects. The annual Staff and Students Christmas show, originated by Roger, which continues to this day, brought many new clients to the field as well as providing useful income to both students and the department.
Marianne has a Studio in Briggait, Glasgow’s former fishmarket building now re-purposed as artists’ studios. She observes that there is a strong tradition, across all GSA schools, of artists choosing to live and work in the city owing to traditionally low rents and a critical mass of fellow artists and designers.
Anderson Marianne
Marianne has selected Joy Bonfield Columbara (GSA, 2014) and Astrid Jaroslawsky, (GSA, 2018)
I chose both graduates because of the themes that they explore in their work which are of personal interest to me. Joy’s ability to skilfully weave narratives that deconstruct the imagery of ancient art, in particular Western classical traditions, creates work which opens doors on these histories in a contemporary way. Astrid came to Glasgow following a goldsmithing apprenticeship at the prestigious Staatlichen Zeichenakademie, Hanau. Her response to the visual language of Glasgow’s buildings was unique and echoes my own fascination with the architectural heritage of the city.
The
Glasgow School of Art
Pamela Flanagan Programme Leader, Interior Design
Wears
Marianne Anderson
Brooch
Pearl Pattern Brooch (oxidised silver, freshwater pearls)
(Ink, paint, 9 years, 18 carat yellow gold and natural sapphires).
Professor Johnny Rodger
Professor of Urban Literature
Views
Astrid Jaroslawsky (GSA, 2018)
Brooch
Second right, second right, first left, repeat (sandstone, jesmonite, silver)
Anna
Anna Gordon (b. 1971) Is Head of Department and Programme Leader for Silversmithing and Jewellery at The Glasgow School of Art. She first began teaching part time at the school in 1999 becoming Head of Department in 2019. She studied at Edinburgh College of Art under Dorothy Hogg and established her first studio in Edinburgh in 1996. Her fine jewellery structures in silver and gold wire reflect her interest in the drawn line, seeing pieces of jewellery as a sketch on the body which creates a moving shadow on the wearer accentuated by the play of light across metal surfaces. She has exhibited and is collected internationally with works in the permanent collection of the Victoria & Albert Museum, London/Dundee; the Goldsmiths Company, London and National Museums of Scotland, Edinburgh.
Anna has a family connection to Glasgow as her father worked as a pattern maker for the shipbuilding industry. His workshop in the family home in Fife was an early inspiration as she experimented with making small works in response to the precise simplicity of Scandinavian objects in her home: her mother is Danish. Anna recalls her first visit to Glasgow was to see an exhibition, with her father, at the GSA’s magnificently designed Mackintosh Building (built 1897–1909). She remembers her excitement about being in that building: ‘it felt like a workshop not a museum space: tactile, with surfaces created through use. As a student in Edinburgh, visits to Glasgow continued as the city had, and has, a very active music scene and more nightlife for young creatives helped by the fact that many artists stay in the city after graduation.
As Programme Leader, Anna has overseen the high-profile development of the Department with a carefully planned balance of part time and visiting tutors and artists’ residency programmes. There is always a significant presence of her student cohort in London’s ‘jewellery Oscars’ the annual Goldsmiths Crafts and Design Awards (in 2023 GSA students led the field with 23 awards). In recent years, she has built a growing number of projects such as Bus Stop Jewellery Conversations (https:// busstop.jewelleryconversations.com) which has helped sustain the relationship between city and department through the challenges of Covid years and then the double fire of the Mackintosh Building in 2014 and 2018. She is clear that Glasgow is her artistic home and the can-do attitude of a city built on making (Clyde-built is an expression for solid craftsmanship which derives from the shipbuilding industry) continues to support a community of makers
Anna has chosen alumni Miki Asai (GSA, 2017) and Eleanor Whitworth (GSA, 2019) as her guest exhibitors.
Gordon
What draws me to both Miki and Ellie’s jewellery is the drawn quality to the work. Both use drawing as a starting point and both demonstrate a wonderful use and control of materials to express these drawn qualities. The works are quite different, with Miki’s approach to solid forms, extremely light weight and an exquisite approach to applied surface pattern where Ellie’s pieces use wire and line or the line of the saw to express the qualities of the drawn line.
The Glasgow School of Art
Professor Penny Macbeth
Director, The Glasgow School of Art Wears
Anna Gordon Brooch
Perpendicular Circles (18 carat yellow gold).
Keisha Rowe
Widening Participation Development Officer
Wears Miki Asai (GSA, 2017)
Brooch
Still Life, (wood, Japanese paper, eggshell, mineral pigment, Japanese lacquer, gold leaf, silver, steel wire).
Susan Lee-Kidd
Admissions Co-ordinator
Wears
Eleanor Whitworth (GSA, 2019)
Brooch
Entangled Life, (18 carat yellow gold).
Andrew Lamb (b. 1978) was born in Edinburgh and studied at Edinburgh College of Art and the Royal College of Art, London. He established his first workshop in London in 2004 before returning to Scotland full time in 2010 living first in Edinburgh then Aberdeen before moving to set up home and studio in Glasgow in 2017. He has been a part-time lecturer at The Glasgow School of Art since 2009. He works predominantly with precious metal wire, using formidable technical skill and a prolonged study of the patterns and structures both within the natural world –movement of water, birds’ feathers – and woven textiles to explore his interest in optical illusion animated as pieces are worn. He exhibits his work internationally and has works in many public collections including Aberdeen Art Gallery; Crafts Council, London; Goldsmiths Company, London; National Museums of Scotland, Edinburgh; Wedgwood Collection; V & A Museum, London.
Andrew visited Glasgow regularly whilst growing up, going West to watch the football with his father and brother also taking in visits to major art collections such as the Burrell Collection in Glasgow. He was hugely inspired by trips to see the art school open day and degree shows, before gaining a place at Edinburgh College of Art, initially with the intention of studying graphic design.
As part of his first-year general studies, however, he had the opportunity to spend time in the Jewellery and Silversmithing Department at that college, then under the direction of Professor Dorothy Hogg and was instantly drawn to a career in fine metalworking and jewellery.
Glasgow came into focus again during his postgraduate studies in London as many of his contemporaries such as David Goodwin and Hannah Louise Lamb were Glasgow graduates. Following graduation Andrew worked as a technician at the RCA (2007–2009) through which he got to know other Glasgow postgraduate students from Glasgow such as Jonathan Boyd. Andrew also met Glasgow trained silversmith Grant McCaig when both designers represented the UK at Munich’s annual Talente fair in 2002. The opportunity to teach in Glasgow in 2009 then seemed like a natural progression for the artist.
He remembers the excitement to be part of the GSA as the School was highly valued for its teaching in contemporary art and design both in the City and in the profession. He found the community of students and colleagues immediately inspiring at both social and intellectual levels. He also became increasingly aware of Glasgow’s international presence beyond and within his specialist field. The City has, for example, high profile in areas like music where tradition and innovation intersect in unique ways, seen in organisations such as the Royal Conservatoire and festivals such as Celtic Connections. He was able to visit China in 2014 as a Visiting Lecturer and again in 2018 on an Erasmus teaching exchange at Tsinghua Academy of Arts and Design, Beijing Art University and enjoys the expanding international links fostered through his connection to the art school and his own practice.
Andrew has selected works by silversmith Patrick Davison (GSA, 2011) and jeweller Emma Gregory (GSA, 2013).
Andrew Lamb
I love works that balance skills in making and craftsmanship, alongside strong concepts, and artistic innovation. These are qualities associated with many of our graduates and stand out in the work of Patrick and Emma. Patrick has a natural understanding of working with metal and continues to develop his stunning metal surfaces through sustained research, working with Italian masters such as Stefano Marchetti and Giovanni Corvaja and developing new precious metal alloys.
Emma has developed a unique body of wearable jewellery forms based on her active research into the patterns generated by drum and bass electronic music. She builds unique structures that translate both musical rhythms and associated graphic notation into jewel forms.
The Glasgow School of Art
Anthony Coffield
Lecturer, Interior Design
Wears
Andrew Lamb
Brooch
Linear Frequency III
(Titanium, 18 carat yellow gold, white gold, silver)
Michael Stewart Birkbeck Pell (b. 1964) has been a lecturer at The Glasgow School Art since 2005. Born in Sydney, Australia, Michael was brought up in a creative ‘fix it at home’ culture of making. His father was an avionics engineer and Michael was moving towards a career in engineering or architecture. Jewellery however had a strong presence in his life as his grandmother shared with him a beautiful collection of early European jewellery inherited from earlier generations of the Pell family who first came to Australia in 1852: Michael’s great-grandfather was the first Professor of Mathematics and Natural Philosophy at University of Sydney. As a young Michael explored his own queer and neo-colonial identity in 1980s Sydney he became increasingly interested in the way that jewellery could express contemporary forms of identity and while studying at Sydney Institute of Technology in 1998 he took on an old commercial warehouse in Surry Hills to develop as a home and establish a shared workshop, and after graduating in 2000 opened a gallery space representing other artist jewellers.
His interest in male adornment has always intrigued him: a theme he later explored in Glasgow with the exhibition ‘Not Pretty’ at the GSA in 2011, shown in Sydney the same year. His work as gallerist and curator increasingly dominated his practice connecting him to the burgeoning international art jewellery scene in Australia throughout the 1990s. He remembers the pioneering work of Mari Funaki in Melbourne; innovative practitioners such as Warwick Freeman in New Zealand and the valuable profile given to Australian work by Paul Derrez at Galerie Ra in Amsterdam. Michael’s active career as a curator and teacher has continued to follow this collaborative path both in Australia and, since 2005 in Scotland.
Michael first visited Glasgow in 1989 when living in London, then again from Sydney in 1998 when his partner, Dr. John Ewan was participating in Glasgow’s groundbreaking biennial International HIV conference. Ewan had Scottish ancestry and family in Glasgow through whom Michael met the silversmith Roger Millar, then running the Department of Silversmithing and Jewellery at Glasgow. He maintained contact with Roger and his colleague Jack Cunningham and in 2002 was invited to mount an exhibition of Australian work by young designers ‘Metamorphosis’ in the Atrium Gallery at the art school. In 2005 Michael and his partner moved full time to Scotland following the latter’s acceptance of a role in specialised medical practice in Glasgow. Michael secured a four-month jewellery residency at the prestigious Edinburgh College of Art followed by taking up his current part-time role at The Glasgow School of Art. Completing a PG Cert in Learning & Teaching through UAL in 2006, he is a fellow of Advance HE (formerly HEA).
Michael loves the directness and practical nature of his adopted home city. He has become fascinated by its history of making and engineering, shown in early educational structures such as the Mechanics Institutes, and the strong interest in fine art practice from the Glasgow Boys to the bold contemporary art networks which have fostered international links.
Michael has chosen Frances Wadsworth-Jones (GSA, 2006) and Jonathan Boyd (GSA, 2006) as his alumni.
I enjoy Frances’ fearless, fine art approach to jewellery she is a wonderful observer, with a playful sense of humour: finely crafted work with a subversive element. Jonathan was an interesting student in my first years of teaching: a great capacity to learn, embrace and exploit new technologies… a very spontaneous response to new ideas.
Polly Christie
Archives and Collections Manager
Wears
Michael Pell
Brooch
Respicere, brooch (silver, 9ct gold re-purposed sovereign holder, diamond)
Necklace
Imagined Heirlooms (silver, 18ct gold, quartz)
Cultures of Making
Jimmy Stephen-Cran Head of Fashion and Textiles
Wears
Frances Wadsworth-Jones (GSA, 2006)
Necklace
Pearl Thieves (freshwater pearls, 18 carat gold)
Deborah Holland Course Leader, Portfolio Preparation – Creative Practices
Wears
Jonathan Boyd (GSA, 2006)
Brooch
Beneath the Surface, (mild steel, stainless steel, enamel)
Silvia Weidenbach
Silvia Weidenbach (b. 1980) has been a part time- lecturer at the Department of Silversmithing and Jewellery at The Glasgow School of Art since 2018. She is also a Visiting Lecturer at the London College of Fashion; Haute École d‘Art et de Design, Geneva, Switzerland and Designskolen Kolding, Denmark. Born into the rural winemaking region of Germany she was always an active maker and following work experience in 1995 at a local jewellers’ workshop her path towards jewellery was confirmed. She undertook an apprenticeship as a silversmith at Staatliche Berufsfachschule für Glas und Scmuck in Kaufbeuren-Neugablonz (2000–2003) followed by a diploma at Burg Giebichenstein University of Art and Design Halle studying under Professor Daniel Kruger and David Bielander. She came to the UK to study for a Masters at the Royal College of Art (2009–2011) under Hans Stofer and Michael Rowe attracted by the experimental potential of the London scene at the time. She continues to have a London workshop.
Silvia’s active European career springs from her interest in the new possibilities of making, pioneering the use of 3D technologies. Her bold, coloured jewel forms are opulent and exuberant interweaving 3D printed lightweight forms with precious metals and traditionally-set gemstones. Silvia was the first Gilbert Collection Artistin-Residence at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, where her work is part of its permanent collection. Works are in major collections including National Museum of Scotland in Edinburgh, Germanisches Nationalmuseum in Nuremberg, Schmuckmuseum Pforzheim, Deutsches Goldschmiedehaus in Hanau, as well as the Alice and Louis Koch Collection in the Swiss National Museum in Zurich.
Silvia’s first connection to Glasgow came in 2010. Her RCA silversmithing tutor Rebecca de Quinn organised opportunities for students to undertake university teaching experience and matched Silvia with The Glasgow School of Art. Silvia was aware of the art school, through her studies in 20th century art and design history at Halle, which drew attention to the original art school building designed by Charles Rennie Mackintosh. She was also aware of important jewellery artists working in Glasgow such as the late Peter Chang (1944–2017) having seen his work on show at Galerie Biro in Munich. Seven years later Silvia was invited to return to Glasgow to teach and remembers her impression of the warm response from different Glasgow residents when she mentioned her connection to the art school. This confirmed her sense that the identity of the School was strongly attached to the identity of the city although she remains fascinated by the complex question of what is the Glasgow aesthetic today and how this historic connection might be built on more holistically in the future.
Silvia has chosen alumni Siri Hansen (GSA, 2024) and Iona Turner (GSA, 2021).
I am attracted by the environmentally conscious and inventive choice of materials of both artists. Iona Turner has an ongoing jewellery collection ‘The Seaweed Gatherer’. Iona began her research into seaweed during Covid lockdown, becoming aware of materials close to hand. She became increasingly fascinated by its natural ecology and its potential to be transformed as a material for jewellery. Siri Hansen has developed her collection ‘Plastic Metamorphism’ through integrating re-purposed waste – broken jewellery, discarded plastics – with precious materials to create a new form of sustainable adornment.
The Glasgow School of Art
Professor Rachel Dickson
Deputy Director Academic
Wears
Silvia Weidenbach
Brooch
Coral_Crescendo_2018 (18 carat gold, silver, 3D printed moondust, antique coral)
The Department of Silversmithing + Jewellery are delighted to be supported by the GSA’s Creative Network for ‘Cultures of Making’.
The Glasgow School of Art’s Creative Network was established to facilitate collaborations, connections and opportunities for our network of over 25,000 students, alumni and industry partners.
Spanning all disciplines, representing a multitude of industries and residing in over 95 countries around the world, our Creative Network aims to connect one of the largest, most diverse creative communities. An innovative, professional approach to alumni and industry relations, whether supporting activity across the city of Glasgow or making introductions across the globe, Creative Network actively looks to develop and initiate high impact projects and professional partnerships with our community.
@theglasgowschoolofart creativenetwork@gsa.ac.uk
Image below: James Porteous (Product Design 2012). Electric Spirit Company received the prestigious title of The Scottish Gin of the Year
The Glasgow School of Art
Image top: Kathleen Reilly (Silversmithing and Jewellery 2015).
Oku, designed and carefully crafted in Japan, winner Dezeen Homeware Design of the Year 2022.
Image above and left: Andrew Flynn and Martin Keane (Product Design Engineering 2014).
POTR officially launched its range of recycled, origami-inspired plant pots in Japan, 2024.
Acknowledgements
Photography by:
Alan McAteer, mcateer photography 2024.
Thanks to:
WCG project fund
Amanda Game
Grassimuseum Leipzig
Sabine Epple
Olaf Thorman
Staff and alumni of The Glasgow School of Art.
Cultures of Making, Grassimuseum Leipzig, October 2024
Exhibitors (alphabetical order)
Marianne Anderson marianneanderson
Miki Asai miki__asai
Joy Bonfield Columbara joy_bc
Jonathan Boyd jonathanmathewboyd
Patrick Davison p.e.davison
Anna Gordon annagordonjewellery
Emma Gregory emmamfgregory
Siri Hansen sirihansen2
Astrid Jaroslawsky Astrid.jaroslawsky@gmail.com
Andrew Lamb andrewlambjewellery
Michael Pell m.pell@gsa.ac.uk
Iona Turner iona.maker
Frances Wadsworth-Jones fwj__studio
Silvia Weidenbach silviaweidenbach
Eleanor Whitworth eleanorwhitworth
Covers: GF Smith Wild White 850gsm
Text: Fedrigoni Arena Rough Natural 140gsm
Design by D8.
Printed by Core Image, Glasgow.
In Cultures of Making The Glasgow School of Art’s Silversmithing and Jewellery Department demonstrate how firmly intertwined the School and Department are with the history and contemporary life of the City of Glasgow. Foreword by Amanda Game, exhibition maker and curator with a specialist interest in supporting contemporary makers: their thinking and their objects.
