Ursula Ilse-Neuman – författare

Linda MacNeil: Jewels of Glass is the first in-depth monograph to explore the development of leading American jeweller Linda MacNeil's jewellery and her contribution to late twentieth- and twenty-first century jewellery. MacNeil has inserted her voice into contemporary American jewellery as an innovator transforming glass into proxies for precious gemstones. She and her work have straddled the fields of Studio Glass and Studio Jewellery. A pioneer over her forty-and-counting-year career, she has united glass with metal and, recently, with precious gems. Exploring materiality and methodology, she uses historical precedent as a jumping off point to make stunning, wearable jewellery. This scholarly study presents approximately fifty of MacNeil's most significant pieces. Davira S. Taragin's essay interweaves MacNeil's biography with discussions of the development of her aesthetic. Noted jewellery historian Ursula Ilse-Neuman contextualises MacNeil's achievement within the art jewellery movement in general and the use of glass in jewellery over the centuries.

Ring Redux presents more than a hundred avant-garde rings by renowned international artists who explore this age-old jewellery form with great vitality and relevance to society today. In the essay “Riffs on Rings”, Ursula Ilse-Neuman provides valuable insights into the astonishing variations on one of the most intimate and enduring forms of body adornment, revealing the profound and subtle differences in how these artists evoke the ring’s potential to express ideas that extend beyond its ornamental role. The skill and audacity infused in these intimate sculptural forms is captured in stunning new colour photographs. In the “Artists’ Voices” section, the jewellers provide valuable perspectives on the conception and execution of their works. The collection of rings presented here has been acquired over five decades by Susan Grant Lewin and will be exhibited at the SCAD Museum of Art, Savannah, Georgia.

The consummate Susan Grant Lewin Collection - recently donated to Cooper Hewitt - captures the diversity and achievements of contemporary art jewellery with nearly 150 significant works from the last 15 years by designers from the United States, Europe, Asia and Australia. The brooches, necklaces and rings reveal how these contemporary jewellers have revolutionised the medium in transforming jewellery conventions as expressions of our time. Descriptions of specific works demonstrate that while the mastery of materials and techniques is critical to the creative process, it is not an end in itself, but only the means to accomplish an aesthetic vision. Process statements from each designer and a full gallery of the jewellery accompany the narrative sequence of extraordinary, stirring, unique pieces.Published to accompany the Exhibition at Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum, New York (US), 17 November 2017-28 May 2018.