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Archive for the ‘Learn To Bead’ Category

How-To advice and instructions; special insights for making jewelry

POINTS, LINES, PLANES, SHAPES, FORMS, THEMES: Creating Something Out Of Nothing

Posted by learntobead on July 20, 2018

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POINT, LINE, PLANE, SHAPE, FORM, THEME:
Creating Something Out Of Nothing
by Warren Feld, Jewelry Designer

Abstract
The artist creates something out of nothing. And the jewelry artist does the same, but also imposes this act on the person who wears the result, who in turn, decides whether to display or demonstrate its desirability and wearability, and all within a particular context or situation. So, we start with nothing into something. That something takes up space. That space might be filled with objects we call points, lines, planes, shapes, forms and themes. With whatever that space is filled, and however these objects are organized, the space and its composition convey meaning and value, communicated not merely to the artist, but as importantly, to the wearer and viewer, as well. As Design Elements, it is important to differentiate among the power of each of these objects to focus, anchor, direct, balance, move, expand, synergize, coordinate, conform, bound, connect, and violate.

POINT, LINE, PLANE, SHAPE, FORM, THEME:
Creating Something Out Of Nothing

The artist creates something out of nothing.

And the jewelry artist does the same, but also imposes this act on the person who wears the result, who in turn, decides whether to display or demonstrate its desirability and wearability, and all within a particular context or situation.

So, we start with nothing into something.

That something takes up space.

Space separates and connects us with things.     It is these arrangements and contrasts which allows us to find meaning, feel connected, recognize implications.

That space might be filled with points, lines, planes, shapes, forms and themes.    We might add color, texture and pattern.

With whatever that space is filled and organized, the space and its composition convey meaning and value, not merely for the jewelry artist, but as importantly, for the wearer and viewer, as well.    Filling space with objects will always create a level of tension because any viewer will feel compelled to make sense of it all.   This is work.   This is risky – what if the person evaluates poorly or makes a mistake or shows bad judgement or is compelled to pretend to understand?    It’s always easier (and perhaps safer) for the person to turn and look away.   To reject the jewelry.   Not wear it. Not buy it.

Jewelry designers do not want people to avoid their creations.   So, it is important to also anticipate what happens when more objects are added to the composition.    Further adding to and organizing and arranging these points, lines, planes, shapes, forms and themes into a design will exacerbate things even more, increasing the risk, but also the reward, for the viewer to maintain their stance, keep looking at it, and keep trying to figure out what it all means, and what it all means for him or her.

Meaning and value emerge from some type of this dialectic-type interaction, first between artist and self, and then between artist and client, often reflected in the selection of materials and choices about arrangements.   The meta-qualities and inspirations and aspirations underlying these decisions then transition into forms and themes.

This emergence is contextually bound by shared understandings about whether the piece should be judged as finished and successful.

The choices are infinite.

Let’s begin to decode points, lines, planes, shapes, forms and themes.    The jewelry designer’s ability to learn about, manage and control space is perhaps the most critical skills to develop.

^[1]Points, lines, planes, and shapes are independent design elements, and forms and themes are their dependent cousins.   Independent design elements function a little like vowels in the alphabet, and can stand alone and be expressive. Dependent design elements function more like consonants, and typically require some combination with independent elements to have fully formed expressions.

Whatever their independence or dependence, these design elements are progressively interrelated.     As we move from point along the list to theme, we increase our power to express meaning, establish value, create tensions, and resonate.     As we use more than one of these elements – either more of the same element or combinations of different ones — within the same composition, we also are increasing our artistic and design control, power, and ability to show intent, establish meaning, and achieve a successful result.

These design elements discussed here are considered objects to the extent that they are things to be positioned and manipulated.    They are considered parts of structures to the extent that they are part of some organization or arrangement.   Both objects and structures express meaning and value, but structures moreso.

Themes are explanatory meanings resulting from the interpretation of forms.   They may be literal or abstract.   They may be symbolic and layered.   They may be culturally- or situationally-specific.

Forms are especially coherent combinations and arrangements of points, lines, planes and shapes.   They may be distinct or overlapping.    They may be fully formed or partially formed.   They reflect broader, deeper meanings and reflections – something considerably beyond the meanings of the component parts.

Shapes are bounded lines and planes, delimiting spatial units which convey much more meaning than their individual component lines and planes could ever suggest on their own.    Shapes function in 2- or 3-dimensions. Shapes are interpretable, whether they are immediately or easily recognized, or not.

Planes are defined by the intersection of 2 lines, or the presence of 3 noncollinear (not on the same line) points, or 2 parallel lines, or a line and a point not on that line.   Planes suggest the ideas of existence, thought, and development.   Planes imply the possibilities for movement and dimension.

Lines are defined as a series of points. Lines imply the possibilities for boundaries, directions and movement.    They can be used to measure things.    They can demarcate that which is OK and sacred from that which is unacceptable or dangerous or profane.

Points change the nothingness of space into something-ness.   They can focus the attention.    Points are the simplest geometric elements which imply the possibilities for imposing individual intent, meaning and value on the universe.   The presence of two or more points can suggest relativity.

The jewelry designer cannot ignore any of this.   As design elements, points, lines, planes, shapes, forms and themes are an integral part of the jewelry artist’s tool box.    As elements within compositions, they are to be constructed or manipulated into principled arrangements we call jewelry.   They allow the artist to show his or her hand.   They are some of the major building blocks the artist uses to convey meaning and connectedness, show intent and inspire others.

As Design Elements, it is important to differentiate among the power of each of these elements to…

(1) Focus the eye
(2) Anchor or establish some kind of predominance or hierarchy within a composition
(3) Direct the eye
(4) Establish balance, order, and a satisfying distribution of proportions and sizes, or their opposite
(5) Give a sense of movement and flow
(6) Give a sense of dimension
(7) Synergize or marry the relationship between positive and negative space
(8) Establish a sense of coherence, coordination, sameness, unity, difference, and/or variety, or some grouping rules for elements
(9) Conform to the shape of the body
(10) Establish a silhouette or personal identity
(11) Connect to a time frame, context, or situation
(12) Conform to or violate shared expectations about good design

As used with Principles of Composition, Construction and Manipulation, it is important to understand how each of these elements can enhance or impede the artist’s ability to arrange objects to achieve a finished and successful piece of jewelry.    Each can support or detract from a compelling arrangement.

The designer does not have to use all of these elements.    But the designer does need to know what each can and cannot be used to do.    The designer must develop that intuitive and fluent knowledge how each of these elements function.    The goal of jewelry design is to communicate.   Communicate the artist’s inspirations and aspirations. Communicate the choices made to turn aspirations into concrete products.    Communicate the self-identifying relevance of jewelry pieces to the wearers.    Communicate the socio-cultural relevance of jewelry pieces both wearers and viewers.

Finally, each element should be used parsimoniously (that is, that Goldilocks point of just right), to attain a level of resonance.    Our jewelry, at the minimum, should evoke an emotion, and more importantly, go a little beyond this and resonate.

POINTS

In math, the point exists but has no mass. However, for this and our other design elements discussed in this article, we use a looser definition in art and design. The point is the simplest geometrically based design element the artist can use to create something out of nothing and draw someone’s attention to a piece. The point can be very small, or medium or large. It can be a simple circle, or a blob, or a square, or anything that might get interpreted as a point.

The point is the building block for everything else. Every mark we can make will be a combination of one or more points. Every line, plane, shape or form is essentially a point, regardless of its size.

Most importantly, the point calls one’s attention to a place where no attention was called for or placed before. They create a reference point. With 2 or more points, that reference point builds up much more meaning. It shows relativity in a relationship. It suggests distance and direction. It can suggest layering or dimension – think two over-lapping points.

Relationships between and among points pose two especially important meanings. One, the relationship that emerges about proportions of the point(s) to the space around it. Two, the relationship that emerges about the position of the point(s) within the space around it. Proportions and positioning.

Jewelry Applications/Decoding Points

A continuous series of points

Points directing your attention

Points which convey distance and relativity

A Point which steers your eye to the upper right, partly due to proportion and placement

The jewelry designer usually starts with a collection of different kinds of points with some determination and a lot of experimentation to arrange them in some pleasing way.    Some points might be various round beads.   They might be beads of different shapes.    They might be a clustering of beads into some shape or form.    They might be a fully formed component.

The artist thinks about the distribution and balance of points.   Sizes, relative sizes, shapes and variety of shapes are pondered over.   Then points are placed, usually, with jewelry, in some kind of circle or silhouette. Their placement may establish a sense of balance, such as symmetry.    Their placement might create a rhythm, either fast or slow.

The artist determines where any emphasis should go.    Often the artist uses a pendant drop, some variation in proportion, or some color placement effect to call a viewer’s attention to a certain part of the jewelry.   These function as points.

The artist determines how emphasis, size, proportionate relationships and placement affect how the piece will be interpreted and decoded by others.   In what way(s) does the point influence the space around it? Should attention be focused or directed?   What kind of rhythm should be established? Should a feeling of closeness, apartness, integration or skew be created?   Have the dots contributed to a sense of symmetry or asymmetry?   Do the points lose their “point-ness” and suddenly get perceived as a lines or shapes, when they move closer together?

The artist decides the number of points to be used, and decides their parsimonious selection and placement.    That is, the artist decides when enough points are enough.      Using more than one point adds a level of tension to the piece.   There is a competition for space and how position and proportion will affect interpretation of the artist’s intent, whether the piece feels finished, and whether the piece is seen as successful.

Overlapping points create a figure/ground perspective.    They change the nature of the space and the person’s interaction with it.   They add depth.    Overlapping points might get re-translated into a new point, or into a new shape.

LINES

Lines are defined by the connections between 2 or more points. Lines have length and width. They connect, they divide, they direct. The points along the line can attract or repel each other. They can emote strength, weakness, or harmony. They can excite, muddle or confuse. They can be actual or implied.

Where points are about emphasis, lines are mostly about direction and movement. A line is not attracting you to a point in space, but rather, it is directing you. Lines prevent the viewer from getting stuck staring at one point in your jewelry composition. They encourage the viewer to move around and take into account the whole piece.

Lines both separate and join things. They establish a silhouette. They demarcate boundaries. They signal a beginning and an end, or travel in one or both directions all the way out to infinity, and perhaps beyond. Lines can violate boundaries, or establish walls around something.

They can curve and curve around things. A line which curves around and connects its beginning to its end becomes a circle. If the line delineating the circle becomes too thick and fills all the negative space, it becomes a point. If the curving line does not meet itself, beginning to end, it becomes a spiral. A curved line usually conveys a different sense of beauty and romance than a straight line.

As lines become thicker, they begin to take on the characteristics of planes. To maintain their identity and integrity as lines, they must always be longer than they are wide. Changing the ratio of the length to the width has the greatest impact on how any line will be perceived and understood.

As lines become thinner, they more and more emphasize the quality of direction. As both endpoints of lines seem to extend towards infinity, they emphasize movement. If one endpoint is fixed, while the other endpoint is allowed to extend towards infinity, more tension is perceived as the space around the line is interpreted by the viewer.

Two or more lines together create a measure of things. People try to make sense of each line, sometimes in combination, but often as individual segments. The interval space between the lines becomes critical in this endeavor.

Eloquence, by Warren Feld, 2018, jasper, jade, Japanese seed beads

Here we have a 7-strand necklace. Look at the use of points, lines, planes and shapes. Look at the interval
spaces between each strand.

When two lines converge, they create an angle between them.    This joint or connecting point becomes the nexus for things moving in two different or altering directions.   The angle and juxtapositions of multiple angles can establish a rhythm.    Angles smaller than 90 degrees generate perceptions of more rapid movement than angles larger than 90 degrees.

When two lines are separated, they often are perceived separately, each with its own identify.    Think of the single vs. the multiple strand necklace or bracelet.    The interval between the lines becomes a critical part of the story ascribed to each line separately.    It is important how that interval’s negative space is filled up or left empty. It is important how wide that interval is between each pair of lines.   Pieces with narrower interval spaces have more tension resulting from how the lines are perceived and thought about.

The width of interval spaces between lines creates rhythm.    The use of color can further enhance (or impede) this perception of rhythm within a piece of jewelry.    Varying the intensity and values of the lines can create dimensionality, where some lines appear to advance and others appear to recede.

Thicker lines placed close together can change the gestalt, where the viewer’s attention shifts from the original lines to the negative interval spaces, now seen as the lines.

Jewelry Applications/Decoding Lines

Parallel lines

Curved lines

Directional lines

Circular lines

Lines are design elements used to compose, construct and manipulate beads and other pieces into jewelry.    They assist the artist in translating inspiration into aspiration, establishing intent, and securing shared understandings about whether the piece is finished and how successful that piece should be judged.

We’ve learned that the control over line includes choices about thinness or thickness, finite or infinite, continuous or sporadic, integrated or disjointed, connected or not, and spacing between intervals.     The presence of more than one line, and the chosen attributes of each line, adds more meaning, more complexity, and more opportunity for the jewelry artist to play with materials, techniques and designs.

The tensions underlying points get assessed and managed differently by the jewelry artist than those underlying lines.   While the point is more about attracting your eye, the line is more about directing it.    Points emphasize and focus and anchor.   Lines add movement and flow.    Points lead us to ideas about balance and predominance.   Lines lead us to ideas about alignment, coordination, closeness, grouping.     Lines add additional measures of meaning, such as those associated with violation, conformance, span of control, silhouette, dimensionality, boundaries and framing and walls.

PLANES

Planes are used to encompass a space.    Planes suggest unity.    Planes provide reference and boundaries and direction.    They suggest dimension and movement.   As such, the use of planes often makes it easier for the viewer to find and interpret meaning of all the other design elements found within or outside that plane.

Because of this, establishing planar relationships among design elements can also lead to a measured sense of history and time and timeliness.    They can lead to more concrete understandings of context and situation within which the other design elements present themselves, and seek to affect.

Planes are created in different ways.   These include,
(a) Two intersecting lines
(b) A line and a point not on that line
(c) Three points, one of which is not on the same linear path as the other two
(d) Two parallel lines

Planes are not restricted to a single point of view.      They allow widespread placement and fragmentation.

Planes may overlap. They may be parallel.   They may intersect.    They may be flat or curved.     Their boundaries may be linear or nonlinear.    They may have clearly defined or diffuse boundaries.   They may be warped and pulled in different directions.

Just as lines can be thought of as an accumulation of points, planes can be thought of as an accumulation of lines.

As a plane becomes larger, it sometimes takes on the characteristics of a point.    If it takes on the characteristics of a point, then its contour takes on more critical importance, diminishing the point-like characteristics, and increasing those of shape-like attributes.

For jewelry designers, planes can be seen to have surfaces. Textures and patterns may be added to these surfaces. Textures involve the placement of 2 or more design elements within the same space and which are seen to somehow relate to one another. Textures have visual impacts. When this structural relationship among textural objects seems to have some order or regularity to it, we refer to the texture as a pattern.

Textures and patterns may be 2- or 3-dimensional. They may be regular, predictable and statistical. Or they may seem random and non-statistical. They may be repeated or singular. They may be both visual and tactile. We may see textures and patterns which are layered or not, or smooth or rough.

Jewelry Applications/Decoding Planes

Simple planes

Multiple planes

Intersecting planes

Overlapping planes

For the jewelry artist, planes can become both a help and a hinderance. They can aid the designer in establishing a coherent point of view. But they can get away from the designer, and allow incoherence and irrelevance to slip into the composition.

SHAPES

When we come to focus on the outer contours of a plane, we begin to recognize this design element as something we call a shape.

Shapes are areas in 2- or 3-dimensions which have defined or implied boundaries.    They are somehow separated from the space surrounding them.     Shapes may be delineated by lines. They may be filled or emptied. They may be formed by differences in color values and intensities.   They may be formed by patterns and textures.   They suggest both mass and volume.

Shapes may be organic or mechanical.   They may relate to the background, foreground or middle ground.    They may be geometrical (regular, predictable contours) or organic, distorted or overlapping, blended or distinct or abstract.

Shapes may be interrelated by angle, sometimes forcing a sense of movement and rotation.

More than one shape in a particular space may make one shape appear more active or more important or more prominent.   This may change the perception of what that shape is about, particularly when shapes overlap.     Secondary shapes may seem more point-like or line-like in relation to the primary shape.

When we recognize something as a shape, we begin to try to impose meaning on it.   Shapes provide orientation.    They are very powerful connectors between viewer and object.   They may take on attribute qualities, such as masculine or feminine.

Shapes have meaning in and of themselves, and are not dependent on the human body for their expressive qualities and powers.     When dependent on the human body, they become forms, rather than shapes.

Jewelry Applications/Decoding Shapes

Repeated butterfly shapes with clear boundaries

Implied butterfly shapes and no boundaries

Jewelry artists need to be able to relate the shape to the message they hope the shape will convey. The shape should reconfirm, rather than obscure, that message.

Part of successfully working with shapes is controlling whether the boundaries are distinct, blurred or implied. Another important part is controlling how the interior space is depicted – such as, left empty and negative, shaded, colored, textured, either partially or fully, densely or not. A last important part is whether the shape represents a 2-dimensional or a 3-dimensional space.

FORMS

Form is any positive element in a composition.    It may be related to points, lines, planes and shapes.

A form cannot be decoded and understood without referencing the space around it.    A viewer must be able to understand and impose some meaning on the relationship between the form and the space it occupies.   A viewer must be able to differentiate the form or figure from the space or ground.    The artist cannot change the form without concurrently changing the space, thus how things get interpreted and related to.   The tension established between form and space determines the extent, time, and motivation of the viewer to interact with that form, and find it satisfying or not.

With jewelry, forms are primarily actualized as they relate to and are worn on the body.   They convey and solidify the expressive relationships among design elements, person and context.     Jewelry forms are not merely structures with wearability.   They are expressive design elements which resonate their expressive purpose and power as they are juxtaposed and positioned against the curvilinearity the human body.

Form tends to be similar to shapes, but more 3D in reality or implied by illusion.    Form can be delineated by light and shadow on it’s surface, whether actual or illusory.

Jewelry Applications/Decoding Forms

Forms supercede their constituent point, line and shape elements

For the jewelry artist, she or he must determine where the point, line, shape and plane end, and where the form begins. This means developing the decoding and fluency skills which can delineate and anticipate what happens to the expressive powers of the jewelry when the piece is worn.

The choice of form becomes a primary consideration in communicating the artist’s message and intent.

The artist must manage the tensions between form and space, foreground (advancing) and background (receding), object (design element) and structure (arrangement).

Forms can have magnetic powers, stickiness, and synergy. Forms can pull your eye in certain directions, or multiply, add, subtract or divide meaning and value, based on positioning, mass and volume. Forms can provide additional control over balance and movement felt within a piece.

THEMES

Themes are ideas which are conveyed by the visual, tactile and contextual experience with the piece of jewelry.   Most often themes are implied, rather than explicit.   They relate the jewelry to the mind, and cannot be understood apart from the individual or group culture in which the jewelry is worn.

Themes are forms which reference, or can be interpreted to have reference, or inflect in some way some reference to individual, group, cultural, societal or universal norms, values and expectations.

Themes infuse or imply power, position, protection, or identification.    They may be clear or abstract.    They may be repeated or not.   They may result from interpretations of individual forms, or whole compositions.    They may be obvious or they may be symbolic.



Jewelry Applications/Decoding Themes

Thematic use of forms

Well developed themes enhance excitement, interest and investigation.    They increase the chances the artist’s design will achieve a level of resonance.

In Summary

Points, Lines, Planes, Shapes, Forms, and Themes are objects used to turn nothingness into something.

That something holds meaning, asserts meaning and expresses meaning.

Points anchor.
Lines direct.
Planes encompass.
Shapes orient.
Forms provide referents.
Themes connect ideas.

Meaning is dialectic, in that how it is ultimately received and interpreted results partly from the fluency of the jewelry designer to use these objects (and other design elements, as well) to translate inspiration into aspiration and aspiration into a finished result, and partly from the various audiences of the designer and their shared understandings about what it means to be finished and what it means to be successful.

Arranging these objects into some organized composition provides a structure for them.    Both the objects themselves, and the structures they are arranged and embedded in, convey expressive meanings.    As these meanings get expressed within shapes, forms and these, their complexity, tensions and implications become deeper and more resonant.

At some point in the design process, points, lines, planes and shapes take on the characteristics of forms and themes.    That is, the jewelry is no longer decoded as a set of individual parts.    Decoding jewelry becomes more contingent on how the jewelry relates to the body (forms) and how the jewelry relates to the individual or group culture within which it is worn (themes).   The whole of the composition takes on meaning and value beyond that of the sum of its parts.

So, take a moment.   Grab a pen and blank piece of paper.      Draw a dot.

You are now an artist.
Draw a series of dots, lines, planes and shapes in the form of a necklace.

You are now an artist with an interest in jewelry.

Jot down some ideas how you would build upon your initial sketch and develop forms and themes.    You might re-interpret what you drew as a series of components.   You might select other design elements – particularly Color – to better define the forms and establish a them.

You are now a jewelry artist.

Think about how your developing piece of jewelry reflects your personal inspirations and intent.    Anticipate how others will view your piece of jewelry and judge it as finished and successful.    Think about clues you can look for to reconfirm to yourself that your jewelry has degree of resonance — that others will not just appreciate it, but want to wear it.

You are now a jewelry designer.

_________________________________________________________
WARREN FELD, Jewelry Designer
warren@warrenfeldjewelry.com
615-292-0610

For Warren Feld, Jewelry Designer, (www.warrenfeldjewelry.com), beading and jewelry making have been wonderful adventures. These adventures have taken Warren from the basics of bead stringing and bead weaving, to wire working and silver smithing, and onward to more complex jewelry designs which build on the strengths of a full range of technical skills and experiences.

Warren leads a group of instructors at Be Dazzled Beads (www.bedazzledbeads.com). He teaches many of the bead-weaving, bead-stringing, jewelry design and business-oriented courses. He works with people just getting started with beading and jewelry making, as well as those with more experience.

His pieces have appeared in beading and jewelry magazines and books. One piece is in the Swarovski museum in Innsbruck, Austria.

He is probably best known for creating the international The Ugly Necklace Contest, where good jewelry designers attempt to overcome our pre-wired brains’ fear response for resisting anything Ugly.
_________________________________________________________

_________________________________________
FOOTNOTES

^[1]Bradley, Steven, Points, Dots, And Lines: The Elements of Design Part II, Web Design, 7/12/2010. This article incorporates many ideas from this article.
as seen on https://vanseodesign.com/web-design/points-dots-lines/

The Goal-Oriented Designer: The Path To Resonance

Posted by learntobead on May 18, 2018

THE GOAL-ORIENTED DESIGNER:

The Path To Resonance

by Warren Feld, Designer

“Vestment”, Warren Feld, 2004, Miyuki cubes, seed beads and delicas, Austrian crystals, with 14KT, gold filled, sterling silver, and antiqued copper chain, clasps and other findings, lampwork bead by Lori Greenberg

Abstract:

Jewelry Designers want to be successful. But things can get a little muddled when thinking about how to get there. Our teachers, our friends, our colleagues often disagree on this point, and tell us to look for conflicting measures of success. We can often lose sight of what we want to end up with. The Goal-Oriented Jewelry Designer has but one guiding star: To achieve Resonance. Everything else is secondary. We achieve Resonance by gaining a comfort in communicating about design. This comfort, or disciplinary fluency, translates into all our composing, constructing and manipulating choices. This is empowering. Our pieces resonate. We achieve success.

THE GOAL-ORIENTED DESIGNER:

The Path To Resonance

Jewelry Designers want to be successful.

But things can get a little muddled when thinking about how to get there. Where should they start? What should they learn first? What materials should they accumulate? What techniques should they start with? Should they focus on the process of designing jewelry? Or moreso on making jewelry? Or still yet, on achieving certain target measures, such as numbers of pieces made, or numbers of sales, or numbers of venues in which their jewelry is sold? Are there qualitative things which are important to accumulate, such as self-satisfaction or customer-satisfaction? Or style? Or recognition? Acceptance? Understanding?

Our teachers, our friends, our colleagues often disagree on how to get there, and tell us to look for“Vestment”, Warren Feld, 2004, Miyuki cubes, seed beads and delicas, Austrian crystals, with 14KT, gold filled, sterling silver, and antiqued copper chain, clasps and other findings, lampwork bead by Lori Greenberg

Abstract:

Jewelry Designers want to be successful. But things can get a little muddled when thinking about how to get there. Our teachers, our friends, our colleagues often disagree on this point, and tell us to look for conflicting measures of success. We can often lose sight of what we want to end up with. The Goal-Oriented Jewelry Designer has but one guiding star: To achieve Resonance. Everything else is secondary. We achieve Resonance by gaining a comfort in communicating about design. This comfort, or disciplinary fluency, translates into all our composing, constructing and manipulating choices. This is empowering. Our pieces resonate. We achieve success.

THE GOAL-ORIENTED DESIGNER:

The Path To Resonance

Jewelry Designers want to be successful.

Our teachers, our friends, our colleagues often disagree on how to get there, and tell us to look for, what turn out to be in effect, conflicting measures of success. We can often lose sight of what we want to end up with. We get a lot of contradictory advice. How should we organize our creative work and our time? How should we select materials and techniques? How do we know when our piece is finished? How should we anticipate our client’s desires? How should we showcase our jewelry? How should we be judged and evaluated? We need to perform, we want to perform authentically, but how – how should we perform as a jewelry designer? The search for answers can be very frustrating, confusing, even demoralizing.

But it shouldn’t be. Every jewelry designer should have but one guiding star – Resonance. If our jewelry does not have some degree of resonance, we keep working on it. If the process of creative exploration and design does not lead us in the direction of resonance, we change it. If the results we achieve – numbers of pieces made and numbers of pieces sold – is not synced tightly with resonance, we cannot call ourselves designers.

The Goal-Oriented Jewelry Designer specifies those goals about performance which will lead to one primary outcome: To achieve Resonance. Everything else is secondary. Design elements are selected and applied with that idea of Resonance in mind. Principles of Composition, Construction and Manipulation are applied with that idea of Resonance in mind, with extra special attention paid to the Principle of Parsimony – knowing when enough is enough.

People may approach the performance tasks in varied ways. For some this means getting very detailed on pathways, activities, and objectives. For others, they let the process of design emerge and see where it takes them. Whatever approach they take in their creative process, for all designers, a focus on one outcome – Resonance – frees them up to think through design without encumbrance.

This singular focus becomes a framework within which to question everything and try to make sense of everything. Make sense of what the materials and techniques can allow them to do, and what they cannot. Make sense of what understandings other people – clients, sellers, buyers, students, colleagues, teachers – will bring to the situation, when exploring and evaluating their work. Make sense of why some things inspire you, and other things do not. Make sense of why you are a jewelry designer designing jewelry. Make sense of the fluency of your artistic expression, what works, how it works, why it works.

We achieve Resonance by gaining a comfort and ease in communicating about design. This comfort and ease, or disciplinary fluency, has to do with how we translate our inspirations and aspirations into all our compositional, constructive and manipulative choices. It is empowering. Our pieces resonate. We achieve success.

Resonance, communication, success, fluency – these are all words that stand in place for an intimacy between the designer and the materials, the designer and the techniques, the designer and inspiration. They reflect the designer’s aspirations. They reflect the shared understandings of everyone the designer’s jewelry is expected to touch. They reflect the designer’s managerial prowess in bringing all these things together.

Resonance and disciplinary fluency result from a well-managed jewelry design process ^[3]. This process of creativity involves artist, audience and context. It is very interactional. Transactional. Integrative. Contingent.

For the artist, this process functions on several, coordinated levels, including…

Contemplation
Inspiration
Aspiration
Anticipation
Specification
Application
Fluency and Empowerment

CONTEMPLATION: An Intimacy with Materials and Techniques

Contemplation is a mystical theology.

Beads have a mystique to them. You stare at a bead, and, ask what it is. You put some thread on a needle, then the bead on the needle, and ask what to do. You stitch a few beads together, and wonder what will become of this. You create a necklace, and, ask how it will be worn. And you stare at each bead again, and, think where do all these feelings welling up within you come from – curiosity, beauty, peace and calm, reflection, satisfaction, magic, appeal, a sensuousness and sexuality. Your brain and eye enter into this fantastic dance, a fugue of focusing, refocusing, gauging and re-gauging light, color, shadow, a shadow’s shadow, harmony, and discord.

You don’t just bead and make jewelry. There’s a lot involved here.

You have to buy (or fabricate) beads and findings and stringing materials, organize them, buy some extra parts, think about them, create with them, live with some failed creations, and go from there. If there wasn’t something special about how our materials translate light into color, shade and shadow, then jewelry making would simply be work. But it’s not.

You have to put one piece next to another…and then another. And when you put two beads next to each other, or one on top of the other, you’re doing God’s work. There’s nothing as spectacular as painting and sculpting with light.

This bead before you — why is it so enticing? Why do you beg it to let you be addicted? An object with a hole. How ridiculous its power. Some curving, some faceting, some coloration, some crevicing or texturing, some shadow, some bending of light. That’s all it is. Yet you’re drawn to it in a slap-silly sort of way.

When you arrange many beads, the excitement explodes geometrically within your being. Two beads together are so much more than one. Four beads so much more than two. A hundred beads so much more than twenty-five times four. The pleasure is uncontainable. You feel so powerful. Creative. You can make more of what you have than with what you started.

You need to select a method or strategy for arranging your beads. There are so many choices. Your organization should be appealing. It must enhance the power the bead has for you, then transcend as a power the bead has for others. It must be architecturally correct because this architecture determines the wear, drape and flow where the jewelry meets the person at the boundary between bead and body.

And this assembling — another gift. String through the hole, pull, tug, align, and string through the hole, pull, tug, align, and string through the hole, pull, tug, align, and string through the hole, pull, tug, align. So meditative. Calming. How could beads be so stress-relieving, other-worldly-visiting, and creative-exciting at the same time?

Contemplation. To contemplate the bead is to enter the deep reaches of your mind where emotion is one with geometry, and geometry is one with art, and art is one with physics, and beads are one with self.

Designing jewelry is an authentic performance task. This involves a profound intimacy with the materials (and techniques) the artist relies on. This intimacy means understanding how to select them, how to leverage their strengths and minimize their weaknesses, and how to manage their ability to enhance or impede resonance.

INSPIRATION: Becoming One with What Inspires You

Inspirations are sacred revelations you want to share through art and design.

The word inspiration comes from the Latin roots meaning “to breathe into.” But before you can breathe your inspiration into your jewelry, you need to become one with it.

There are these wonderfully exciting, sensually terrific, incredibly fulfilling things that you find as you try to imagine the jewelry you will create. They come from many sources: ideas, nature, images, people, behaviors. They might be realistic or abstract. They may be the particular color or pattern or texture or the way the light hits it and casts a shadow. They may be a need for order over chaos. They may be points of view. They may flow from some inner imagination.

For some reason, these inspirations take on a divine, sacred revelation for you – so meaningful that you want to incorporate them somehow into what you do. A fire in your soul. You want to translate these inspirations into colors, shapes, lines, patterns and textures. You want to impose an organization on them. You want to recapture their energy and power they have had over you. You feel compelled to bring these feelings into ideas.

There are many challenges to inspiration. That which we call “inspiring” can often be somewhat fuzzy. It might be a feeling. It might be a piece of an idea, or a small spot on an image. You might feel inspired, but, cannot put the What or the Why into words or images. On the surface, it may seem important to you, but unimportant to others. You the artist may not feel in control of the inspiration in that it seems like it is something that is evoked, not necessarily directed, by you.

When inspired, artists perceive new possibilities that transcend that which is ordinary around them. Too often, the artist feels passive in this process. This transcendence does not feel like a willfully generated idea. However, it needs to be. The successful artist – one who eventually can achieve a level of resonance – is one who is not only inspired by, but also inspired to. This all requires a great deal of metacognitive self-awareness. The artist must be able to perceive the intrinsic value of the inspiring object, and how to extend this value in design, where the piece of jewelry becomes its expression.

Inspiration is motivating. Inspiration is not the source of creativity; creativity does not come from it. Inspiration, instead, should be viewed as a motivational response to creativity. It motivates the artist, through jewelry and its design, to connect this inspiration with others. It serves as a mediator between the self and the anticipated shared understandings of others. The jewelry encapsulates the artist’s ability to make this connection. When the connection is well-made, resonance follows.

But finding inspirations is not only personal, but more importantly, it is an effort to influence others. It is an act of translating the emotions which resonate in you into some object of art which, in turn, will inspire and resonate with others. How does the inspiration occur to you, and how do you anticipate how this inspiration might occur to others?

Too often we lose sight of the importance of inspiration to the authentic performance task of creating jewelry. We operate with the belief that anyone can be inspired by anything. There’s nothing more to it. Moreover, inspiration gets downplayed when put next to the discussion of the effort of making jewelry itself. But it should not. Inspiration is not less important than perspiration. It plays an equal role in the creative process. The artist’s clarity about why something is inspiring, and why this inspiration motivates the artist to respond, will be critical for achieving success, that is resonance.

ASPIRATION: Translating Creativity into A Technical Product Design

Aspiration motivates the artist to actualize inspiration.

Aspiration is where the artist translates inspiration into a completed product design. The artist begins to control and regulate what happens next. This involves selecting Design Elements^[1] and clustering them to formulate meaningful expressions. The artist then applies Principles of Composition, Construction and Manipulation^[2] for organizing and arranging things into a more complete whole with more elaborated expressions. The greater value the artist places on resonance, the stronger the aspiration will be to achieve it.

Aspiration is future-oriented. It requires a stick-to-it-ness. The artist must be sufficiently motivated to invest the time, energy and money into designing and making the jewelry that will not necessarily be finished, displayed or sold right away. It may require some additional learning and skills-development time. The artist may need to find a level of creativity within, and discover the kinds of skills, techniques and insights necessary for bringing this creativity to the aspired task at hand.

Aspiration requires the calculus: Is it worth it? It adds a level of risk to the project. It forces the artist to pay attention to the world around her or him. This world presents dynamic clues – what I discuss below as shared understandings – about opportunities, constraints, risks, contingencies, consequences, strategies and goals, and likely successes.

For some artists, motivation primarily is seen as instinctual. Think of seat-of-the-pants. Emergent, not controlled. A search for harmony, balance, rhythm, unity as something that feels right and looks right and seems right with the universe. Expressive, yes. Imaginative, yes. But not necessarily resonant.

Achieving resonance, however, is, for the most part, more than instinctual. It has some deliberate quality to it. It is communicative. It requires a purposeful act on the part of the artist. It is a different type of motivation — intentional. The artist might want to convey a specific emotion. Or advocate for some change. Or illustrate a point of view. The artist may want to entertain or teach. Heal. Attract mates. Propagandize. Where a jewelry’s design is not reflective of an artist’s intent, there can be no resonance.

ANTICIPATION: Shared Understandings^[4]

Shared understandings dictate opportunities, contingencies and constraints.

The question of whether the audience correctly infers the presence of the artist’s inspiration, and the sense of how the artist’s hand comes into play within the design, remains. The answer revolves around a dynamic interaction between artist and audience, as they anticipate understandings they share, and ones they do not.

Shared understandings should be enduring, transferable, big ideas at the heart of what we think of as good jewelry design. These shared understandings are things which spark meaningful connections between designer and materials, designer and techniques, and designer and client. We need, however, to recognize that the idea of understanding is very multidimensional and complicated.

Understanding is not one achievement, but more the result of several loosely organized choices. Understanding is revealed through performance and evidence. Jewelry designers must perform effectively with knowledge, insight, wisdom and skill to convince us – the world at large and the client in particular — that they really understand what design is all about. This involves a big interpersonal component where the artist introduces their jewelry to a wider audience and subjects it to psychological, social, cultural, and economic assessment.

Understanding is more than knowledge. The designer may be able to articulate what needs to be done to achieve something labeled good jewelry design, but, may not know how to apply it.

Understanding is more than interpretation. The designer may be able to explain how a piece was constructed and conformed to ideas about good jewelry design, but this does not necessarily account for the significance of the results.

Understanding is more than applying principles of construction. It is more than simply organizing a set of design elements into an arrangement. The designer must match knowledge and interpretation about good jewelry design to the context. Application is a context-dependent skill.

Understanding is more than perspective. The designer works within a myriad of expectations and points of view about good jewelry design. The designer must dispassionately anticipate these various perspectives about design, and, bring some constructed point of view and knowledge of implications to bear within the design and design process.

We do not design in a vacuum. The designer must have the ability to empathize with individuals and grasp their individual and group cultures. If selling their jewelry, the designer must have the ability to empathize with small and larger markets, as well. Empathy is not sympathy. Empathy is where we can feel what others feel, and see what others see.

Last, understanding is self-knowledge, as well. The designer should have the self-knowledge, wisdom and insights to know how their own patterns of thought may inform, as well as prejudice, their understandings of good jewelry design.

How the jewelry designer begins the process of creating a piece of jewelry is very revealing about the potential for success, and ultimately achieving a level of resonance. The designer should always begin the process by articulating the essential shared understandings against which their work will be evaluated and judged. For now, let’s refer to this as Backwards Design^[5]. The designer starts with questions about assessment, and then allows this understanding to influence all other choices going forward.

Some essential shared understandings for good jewelry design, I would posit, might include the following:

Every designer has some creative ability, but may need to learn concepts and techniques and ways to apply them
Some understandings are universal and objective, particularly in reference to the selection, clustering and application of various Design Elements, such as color, shape, movement and dimension.
Other understandings are both objective and subjective. There is universal acceptance of what various organization and arrangement schemes — Principles of Composition, Construction and Manipulation – might be applied by the artist. However, how they are actually applied, and how satisfying that is to various audiences, is very personal and subjective.
The strengths and limitations of various materials or techniques should be respected, maximizing the strengths and minimizing the limitations
Jewelry should communicate and reflect the artist’s intent
Jewelry should affirm the wearer’s purpose and identity in context
Jewelry can only be considered as art, as it is worn
We know the jewelry is finished and successful when the choices made and the tradeoffs among appeal, function, and context are implemented to the point we see parsimony and resonance.

SPECIFICATION: Goal-Orientation

It’s not just what you do…it’s how you get there.

Jewelry designers are too quick to focus on the outcome, and too lax to focus on the process. It’s always things like getting it done. Getting it to the client on deadline. Ending up with something concrete to show someone. Too much concentration on outcome can lead to taking shortcuts. Shortsightedness. Inflexibility. A misunderstanding, perhaps illusion about, whether the piece is finished and successful.

Artists more appropriately should focus on goals. Artists who are focused on goals tend to embrace process. It’s about all the smart choices regarding composition, construction and manipulation you made at each increment along the way. By specifying goals, the artist is encouraged to find connections, and be connected to and aware of shared understandings and their impact on perceived success. When problems arise, a goal-oriented focus allows the artist to be flexible and problem solve. The artist is present from contemplation to inspiration and through to aspiration, anticipation, specification and application. The goal-orientation prevents the artist from becoming lost or paralyzed with inaction.

The jewelry artist pursues several goals at once. The jewelry should be both appealing and functional. It should evoke emotion, elicit response, and resonate. The piece should show both unity and variety. The piece should create opinions, validate status, and reconfirm a cultural and social identify. The piece should be reflective and communicative. It should be pleasurable to the maker, the wearer and the viewer alike.

When specifying goals, it is important to remember that not all goals are alike. The goals I am discussing here are the essential elements related to effective performance. That effective performance results in a finished and successful piece of jewelry reflective of the artist’s hand and which resonates among a varied set of audiences.

The artist needs to set goals which clarify what results need to be accomplished by the time any piece of jewelry is finished and showcased. Goals provide perspective. They are there to prevent the artist from achieving anything less than resonance. These goals relate to generating deep understandings and competence at performance. They are not results-specific per se; they are overarching. They serve as sign-posts to point to and highlight what jewelry designers need to engage with when thinking through and implementing design.

The jewelry designer specifies goals as standards of professional performance, such as…

Leveraging the strengths and minimizing the weaknesses of desired materials and techniques
Discussing and reflecting upon inspirations and motivations toward the expression of the creative self
Defining aspirational intent, point of view, and what it means to connect to various audiences
Delineating shared understandings among self, wearer, viewer, student, master, buyer and seller, in relationship to how the jewelry will be observed and assessed and worn within a context
Elaborating on all artistic and architectural elements and principles which should come into play, and why
Reflecting on personal learning throughout the process, particularly as it relates to developing and expanding on skills related to fluency in design
Determining how skills, insights and lessons learned from the current project might be transferred to your next one

Within each generalized performance goal, the designer can further identify particular tasks, knowledges and skills required in order to accomplish them. Often, with too many choices about what to do, what to include, and how to proceed, priorities and timeframes will need to be set, as well.

Resonance is more easily achieved when the designer approaches design as a process, an understanding of the myriad sets and levels of choices as made within a coherent system of creative thinking and activity, and with clear performance goals to guide the way.

APPLICATION: Unity, Emotions, Resonance

Think like an assessor^[6]…find evidence related to desired results.

What is the evidence we need to know for determining when a piece is finished and successful? What clear and appropriate criteria specify what we should look at?

There are different opinions in craft, art and design about what are the most revealing and important aspects of the work, and which every authentic jewelry design performance must meet.

The traditional criteria used in the art world are that the designer should achieve unity, variety and evoke emotions. These, I feel, may work well when applied to paintings or sculpture, but they are insufficient measures of success when applied to jewelry. Jewelry involves the creation of objects where both artistic appeal as well as practical considerations of use are essential. The artistry of jewelry cannot be distinguished from that jewelry as it is worn, and the context within which it is worn. So, when referencing any jewelry’s design, I prefer to use criteria of parsimony and resonance, instead. We know when a piece is finished and successful when the choices of the artist are deemed parsimonious, and the various audiences perceive the piece to resonate.

Parsimony vs. Unity/Variety

In art, the traditional measure of completion and success is a feeling or sense of “Unity.” Unity signifies how everything feels all right. All the Design Elements used, and how they were coordinated and placed, are very coherent, clear, balanced, harmonious and satisfying. I think the idea of unity begins to get at the place we want to end up. But this concept is not concrete enough for me.

What bothers me the most is that you can have unity, but the piece still be seen as boring when there is no variety. Criteria provided from the art perspective recognizes this. But somehow tempering unity with variety starts to add some ambiguity to our measurements of finish and success. This ambiguity is unacceptable as a principled outcome of jewelry construction.

Another concern I have, is that you can have unity with variety, but, from the art perspective, these assessments rely too much on universal, objective perceptions of design elements and their attributes (for example, the use of color schemes). Resonance is not about picking the correct color scheme. It is more about how that color scheme is used, manipulated, leveraged or violated within the piece. We must not leave the artist, the wearer, and the situation out of the equation. We must not minimize the artist’s hand – the artist’s intent, thinking, strategizing, arranging, pushing the boundaries, even violating the universal, objective rules.

Jewelry creation usually demands a series of judgment calls and tradeoffs. Tradeoffs between aesthetics and functionality. Tradeoffs between artist goals and audience understandings and expectations. Tradeoffs between a full palette of colors-shapes-textures and a very limited one. Any measure of completeness and success needs to result from the forced choice decisions of the artist. It needs to account for the significance of the results, not just the organization of them. It needs to explain the Why, not just the What.

For me, the more appropriate concept here is Parsimony. Parsimony is when you know enough is enough. When the finished and successful piece is parsimonious, the relationship of all the Design Elements and their expressed attributes will be so strong, that to add or remove any one thing would diminish, not just the design, but rather the significance of the design.

Parsimony is sometimes referred to in art and design as Economy, but the idea of economy is reserved for the visual effects. The designer needs to be able to decide when enough is enough. For jewelry designers, we want that economy or parsimony to apply to functional and situational effects, as well.

Parsimony…

– forces explanation; its forced-choice nature is most revealing about the artist’s understandings and intentions

– relies on evidence moreso than assumptions to get at criticality

– focuses examination of the few elements that make a difference

Resonance vs. Evoking Emotions

Finished and successful jewelry should not only evoke emotions, but, should resonate.

Resonance is something more than emotion. It is some kind of additional energy we see, feel and otherwise experience. Emotion is very reactive. Resonance is intuitive, involving, identifying. Resonance is an empathetic response where artist and audience realize a shared (or contradictory) understanding without losing sight of whose views and feelings belong to whom.

Resonance results from how the artist controls light, shadow, and their characteristics of warmth and cold, receding and approaching, bright and dull, light and dark. Resonance results from how the artist leverages the strengths of materials and techniques and minimizes their weaknesses. Resonance results from social, cultural and situational cues. Resonance results from how the artist takes us to the edge of universal, objective understandings, and pushes us every so slightly, but not too, too far, beyond that edge.

Jewelry which resonates…

– is communicative and authentic

– shows the artist’s hand as intention, not instinct

– evokes both an emotional as well as energetic response from wearer and viewer

– shows both degrees of control, as well as moments of the unexpected

– makes something noteworthy from something ordinary

– finds the whole greater than the sum of the parts

– lets the materials and techniques speak

– anticipates shared understandings of many different audiences about design elements and principles, and some obvious inclusion, exclusion or intentional violation of them

– results from a design process that appears to have been more systemic (e.g., ingrained within an integrated process) than systematic (e.g., a step-by-step approach)

– both appeals and functions at the boundary where jewelry meets person

FLUENCY[7] AND EMPOWERMENT: Managing Choices In Expression

Empowerment is about successfully making choices. These are choices about expressing one’s intent through art and design.

These choices could be as simple as whether to follow through on some inspiration. They might involve selection of elements of design, or principled arrangements of beads, forms and components. The designer will make choices about how to draw someone’s attention to the piece, or, present the piece to a larger audience. The designer will make choices between aesthetics and functionality. She or he may decide to submit the piece to a magazine or contest. She or he may want to sell the piece and market it. The designer will make choices about how a piece might be worn, or who might wear it, or when it might be worn, in what context.

The fluent designer will be adept at making these choices. The better designer is able to bring a high level of coherence and consistency to the process of managing all this – intent, shared understandings, knowledge and skills, evaluative review, and reflection and adjustment. This is called “fluency in design”.

Fluency is the ability of the designer to select and connect Design Elements smoothly, in visually and functionally and situationally appropriate ways with understanding. The idea of understanding is broadly defined, to include the artist’s personal goals for expression, as well as the expectations of all the audiences – the wearer, the viewer, the buyer, the seller, the student, the master. The better designer achieves a level of disciplinary literacy where fluency becomes automatic, accurate, and rapidly applied.

The better, more fluent jewelry designer is able to anticipate how others will come to understand these mechanisms and the implications for applying them in one way or another. For example, the better and more fluent designer would be able to select and combine design elements to appropriately differentiate jewelry that would best be worn at work, and jewelry that would best be worn, say, when someone was going to a night club for dancing and socializing.

Lastly, fluency means that the designer has also been taught to look for, anticipate and incorporate context clues. Design does not occur in a vacuum. It has implications which become realized in a context. That context might be historical, cultural or situational.

More proficient, fluent jewelry designers will be comfortable

and somewhat intentional and fluid in their abilities to…

Leverage strengths and minimize weaknesses of materials and techniques.

Decode, select, cluster and apply Design Elements, and implement and apply various organizational arrangements related to Principles of Composition, Construction and Manipulation.
Work within shared understandings about jewelry and its successful design.
Apply key knowledge and skills to achieve the desired result.
Anticipate how their work will be reviewed, judged and evaluated by criteria reflective of these same shared understandings.
Communicate their intent.
Step back, reflect, and validate all their thinking to reject any misunderstandings, and make adjustments accordingly.

RUBRIC^[8] AS THINKING ROUTINE

Designers need a simple map to all these ideas about literacy and fluency – something they can easily review and determine where their strengths and weaknesses are as they gain proficiency and fluency in design. One type of map is a rubric.

A rubric is a table of criteria used to rate and rank understanding and performance. A rubric answers the question by what criteria performance should be judged. The rubric provides insightful clues for the kinds of evidence we need to make such assessments. The rubric helps us distinguish degrees of performance, from the sophisticated to the naïve. The rubric encapsulates what an authentic jewelry design performance would look like.

Such a rubric is presented below for the artist to use as a thinking routine.^[9] Here I have used one rubric to represent both (1) understanding and (2) performance, but, I could have easily created two separate rubrics toward this end. In this rubric table below, the rows represent contemplation, inspiration, aspiration, anticipation, application, and fluency and empowerment. The columns represent the degrees of understanding and performance along a continuum, from proficient on one end to not there yet on the other. By way of example, I use the rubric to assess my performance with a piece I created called Vestment (Feld, 2004).

RUBRIC: How Proficient Am I In Achieving Resonance?

The Rubric…

UNDERSTANDING

PERFORMANCE

4- Proficient

Insightful, intuitive understanding, effectively established, with clear intent, and well supported by details

3-Capable

Well-considered understanding, appropriately established and supported by details

2-Shows Potential

Some plausible understanding, some consistency established and supported by details, but not always sustained

1-Not There Yet

Superficial or no understanding, not consistent or sustained, perhaps vague or incomplete

CONTEMPLATION

Exhibiting an intimacy with the materials and techniques

Purposeful in selection of materials and techniques which synergistically work together

Insightful understanding and clear ability to leverage strengths and minimize weaknesses of materials and techniques

Selects materials appropriate for technique used, and select technique appropriate for task at hand

Some ability to leverage strengths and minimize weaknesses of materials and techniques

Selects materials and techniques for which may have some fit the task at hand, but could not articulate the reasons why

Has limited understanding of the strengths and weaknesses materials and techniques bring to the task at hand

Does not understand the relationship between the selection of materials and techniques and the task at hand

Has no understanding of the strengths and weaknesses materials and technique

INSPIRATION

Sharing sacred revelations art and design

Clearly recognizes intrinsic value between inspiration and the design of finished piece; applies inspiration

Deliberately reflects on using inspiration and the design of the piece to motivate and energized others to so be inspired

Some recognition of the connection between inspiration and the design of finished piece; applies inspiration

Thinks how others might be inspired by and emotionally connected to the piece as well

Passively responds to inspiring objects while designing piece with some intent to evoke a personal emotion but limited intent to evoke that emotion in others; consumes inspiration

Does not think deeply about how the piece might inspire others

Either does not begin with an inspiration, or only a weak connection between an inspiring object and the design of a piece

Does not think about how the piece might inspire others

ASPIRATION

Actualizing inspiration into a design

Can clearly and intentionally

translate a feeling or idea into a jewelry design or model; With considerable intention and control, select and arrange Design Elements, Principles of Composition, Construction and Manipulation resulting in an inspiring design which resonates

Can clearly determine risk-calculus comparing all costs associated with constructing piece relative to all benefits from how the finished piece will be received

Can, with some clarity, translate a feeling or idea into a jewelry design or model, and select Design Elements and Principles of Composition, Construction and Manipulation which come together well and evokes emotion

Has an intuitive feel for the risk-calculus, comparing all costs associated with constructing piece relative to all benefits from how the finished piece will be received

Can translate a feeling or idea into a jewelry design or model, but mostly based on instinct rather than intent; can select Design Elements and Principles of Composition, Construction and Manipulation which results in a satisfying design

Has not taken the time to think about the risk-calculus for implementing a design

A jewelry design emerges somehow, but there is little obvious connection to an inspiration or an artist’s intention

Does not know how to think about the risk-calculus for implementing a design

ANTICIPATION

Awareness of shared understandings

Shows empathy;

can anticipate others’ points of view, and how to incorporate them with his/her own

Can engage with others around this project

Can delineate misunderstandings

Can explain how a piece and its construction conforms to others’ ideas of good jewelry design, and shows some evidence in applying this

Anticipates some understandings, but is somewhat reactive to them

Can explain, in an academic sense, how a piece fits broad understandings about good design, but is weak in applying this

Is weak, in reality, at anticipating others’ understandings about design and is very reactive to them

Cannot explain or apply understandings of how a piece fits a definition of good design

Does not anticipate others’ understandings about design, nor responds to them in any significant way

SPECIFICATION

Clarifying what results need to be accomplished

Can clearly define and articulate those performance goals necessary to achieve resonance

Can implement a coherent process and system of creative thinking and activity as a series of smart choices leading up to the finished product

Can make visible the consequences of his/her design process choices

Can identify what it will take to overcome misunderstandings, and flexibly problem solve, when necessary

Can define some performance goals necessary to achieve resonance

Can implement an organized process of creative production

Can identify some consequences related to his/her design process choices

Can identify misunderstandings and determine some strategies in response, when necessary

Does not overtly define performance goals necessary to achieve resonance; however, may have an intuitive sense of some performance goals which need to occur

Does not work within an organized process of creative production

Does not identify consequences related to his/her design process choices

Does not identify misunderstandings, nor develop strategies for overcoming these when they occur

Is not yet performance goal-oriented.

Does not understand how to define or work within an organized process of creative production

Cannot identify consequences related to his/her design process choices

Does not recognize, or incorporate shared understandings or misunderstandings into the creative process

APPLICATION

Strategically and parsimoniously selecting Design Elements and applying of Principles of Composition, Construction and Manipulation

Provides in-depth, coherent, insightful, and credible reasons, based on evidence and both art and design theory, for all design choices, particularly tradeoffs among aesthetics, function and context

Argues what is central to piece that makes it work; emphasizes application in context

Uses materials, techniques, design elements and principles in an especially novel way

Determines confidently that piece is finished and successful, that is parsimonious and resonant

Provides coherent, insightful reasons based on evidence in art theory for all design choices

Weak or no tradeoffs among aesthetics, function and context.

Uses materials, techniques, design elements and principles in novel way

Judges based on personal and art theory assumptions when piece is finished and successful, that is unified with some variety, and evokes emotions

Provides justifications for design choices, but not grounded in art or design theory and perspective

Does not make any accommodations among aesthetics, function and context

Uses materials, techniques, design elements and principles in interesting or generally appealing way

The piece is finished when the artist stops working on it; no judgements related to success

Does not recognize the design process as a series of choices, or in any way rooted in art or design theory and perspective

Does not understand that tradeoffs may need to get made among aesthetics, function and context

Does not show significant understanding about materials, techniques, design elements, principles, and how to choose, cluster them

Shows no confidence in determining whether piece is finished or successful.

EMPOWERMENT

Managing design process and demonstrating disciplinary literacy

Intuitive; metacognitive; can make choices based on intent, and anticipate implications of choices; can take a critical stance; can

recognize personal and situational biases

Effective and appearing almost effortless decoding Design Elements and applying Principles of Composition, Construction, and Manipulation; has complete and extensive knowledge about Elements and Principles and their application in context

Somewhat intuitive; can articulate some of the intentional choices and their implications made in design process; may not be fully aware of personal and situational biases

Understands what is required for decoding Design Elements and applying Principles of Composition, Construction, and Manipulation, but does this with some effort and some varying degrees of effectiveness; has extensive knowledge of Elements and Principles

Weak demonstration of process management; typically following step-by-step process outline or instructions where most choices have been made for the artist; unaware of implications of choices

Doing some decoding of Design Elements and some applying of Principles, but with some difficulties or misconceptions; may have considerable but not full knowledge of Elements and Principles

No demonstration of process management; requires others to delineate the necessary design and implementation choices; unaware that there are implications for any choice

Noticeable difficulties (or unable to do) decoding Design Elements and applying Principles; generally unfamiliar with full range of Elements and Principles

RUBRIC: How Proficient Am I In Achieving Resonance?

The piece…

“Vestment”, by Warren Feld, 2008

I was contracted to do a series of workshops on Contemporizing Etruscan Jewelry. “Vestment” was one of the pieces I created as a contemporized version of a traditional Etruscan collar. Contemporized refers to drawing inspiration from a traditional piece, not reviving or imitating it per se.

With my contemporized version of this Etruscan Collar, I’ve used bead weaving techniques (Ndebele stitch and Petersburg chain stitch) to get a more dimensional effect, stronger color play, and a more contemporary sense of fashion and wearability.

The piece shown uses Miyuki cubes, seed beads and delicas, Austrian crystals, with 14KT, gold filled, sterling silver, and antiqued copper chain, clasps and other findings. With some pieces, I include artist-created handmade lampwork beads made by Lori Greenberg.

My Etruscan VESTMENT is worn like a scarf. It is meant to present a different jewelry profile than a typical necklace. It is at once formal and relaxed, complementing the body and fashion, rather than competing with it. The Vestment fastens in the front.

The main strips of the vestment are created using a double-layered, Ndebele stitch. These strips are attached to the clasp with an assemblage of pieces created using the Petersburg chain stitch.

Detail 1

Detail 2

Traditional Etruscan Collar

If I were using the Rubric above to evaluate my conception, design and implementation of this piece – Vestment – I would be thinking about the following…

CONTEMPLATION Score 4

Exhibiting an intimacy with the materials and techniques

The Ndebele stitch allows a fluidity and draping while still maintaining the basic shape. Using two small beads and a cube to make the Ndebele stitch, rather than the traditional four small beads to complete the stitch, adds resonance. Creating two overlapping layers of stitching creates unusual color/shadow effects while the piece is worn.

INSPIRATION Score 4

Sharing sacred revelations art and design

This piece draws inspiration from form, cultural color preferences, yet results in a very contemporary piece with more fluidity, dimensionality, movement, and sensual appeal.

ASPIRATION Score 4

Actualizing inspiration into a design

The design shows considerable intent and forethought in bringing together color, materials, techniques, forms, in a coherent arrangement.

ANTICIPATION Score 3

Awareness of shared understandings

The piece is generally well-received, with some questions about how and when it is to be worn, and whether it is sufficiently contemporary in design.

SPECIFICATION Score 3

Clarifying what results need to be accomplished

At the time I created this design, my process was generally organized but with considerable trial and error. Tried to get result of appealing piece, had difficulty making tradeoffs between aesthetics and functionality. Did not have a clear understanding of resonance.

APPLICATION Score 3

Strategically and parsimoniously selecting Design Elements and applying of Principles of Composition, Construction and Manipulation

Was primarily driven by art theory, with more last minute choices about functionality. Otherwise, made strategic choices in selecting materials, construction techniques, and meeting most contemporary expectations.

EMPOWERMENT Score 3

Managing design process and demonstrating disciplinary literacy

Was not fluent in design at this point in time. Most of my great strategic choices were more intuitive than intentional.

_________________________________________________________

WARREN FELD, Jewelry Designer

warren@warrenfeldjewelry.com

615-292-0610

His pieces have appeared in beading and jewelry magazines and books. One piece is in the Swarovski museum in Innsbruck, Austria.

He is probably best known for creating the international The Ugly Necklace Contest, where good jewelry designers attempt to overcome our pre-wired brains’ fear response for resisting anything Ugly.

_________________________________________________________

FOOTNOTES
^[1] Feld, Warren. “Jewelry Design Composition: Playing with Building Blocks Called Design Elements,” 3/17/2018

^[2] Feld, Warren. “Jewelry Design Principles: Composing, Constructing, Manipulating,” 4/25/2018

^[3] Feld, Warren. “Jewelry Design: A Managed Process,” Klimt02, 2/2/18. https://klimt02.net/forum/articles/jewelry-design-managed-process-warren-feld

^[4]Shared Understandings. In another graduate education class, the major text reviewed the differences between understanding and knowledge. The question was how to teach understanding. Worth the read to gain many insights about how to structure teaching to get sufficient understanding to enrich learning.
Understanding by Design by Grant Wiggins and Jay McTighe, 2^nd Edition, Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development, 2005.
^[5] Backwards Design. One of the big take-aways from
Understanding by Design (see footnote 3) was the idea they introduced of “backwards design”. Their point is that you can better teach understanding if you anticipate the evidence others will use in their assessments of what you are trying to do. When coupled with ideas about teaching literacy and fluency (see footnote 2), you can begin to introduce ideas about managing the design process in a coherent and alignable way.
^[6]
Understanding by Design by Grant Wiggins and Jay McTighe, 2^nd Edition, p. 146, Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development, 2005.
^[7]Fluency. I took two graduate education courses in Literacy. The primary text we used was Literacy: Helping Students Construct Meaning by J. David Cooper, M. Robinson, J.A. Slansky and N. Kiger, 9th Edition, Cengage Learning, 2015. Even though the text was not about jewelry designing per se, it provides an excellent framework for understanding what fluency is all about, and how fluency with language develops over a period of years. I have relied on many of the ideas in the text to develop my own ideas about a disciplinary literacy for jewelry design.

^[8]Rubrics.
Understanding by Design by Grant Wiggins and Jay McTighe, 2^nd Edition, p. 146, Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development, 2005.
^[9] Thinking Routines. I teach jewelry design. I find it useful to engage students with various ways of thinking out loud. They need to hear me think out loud about what choices I am making and what things I am considering when making those choices. They need to hear themselves think out loud so that they can develop strategies for getting more organized and strategic in dealing with information and making decisions. My inspiration here was based on the work done by Visible Thinking by Project Zero at Harvard Graduate School of Education .

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Jewelry Design Principles: Composing, Constructing, Manipulating

Posted by learntobead on April 24, 2018

JEWELRY DESIGN PRINCIPLES:

COMPOSING, CONSTRUCTING, MANIPULATING

by Warren Feld, Designer

Abstract:

It is not happenstance that some pieces of jewelry draw your attention, and others do not. It is the result of an artist fluent in design. That fluency begins with selecting Design Elements, but it comes to full fruition with the application of Principles of Composition, Construction and Manipulation. This is where the artist flourishes, shows a recognition of shared understandings about good design, and makes that cluster of jewelry design choices resulting in a piece that is seen as both finished and successful. These Principles represent different organizing schemes the artist might resort to. Jewelry artists translate these Principles a little differently than painters or sculptors, in that jewelry presents different demands and expectations on the artist. The better artist/designer achieves a level of disciplinary literacy – selecting Design Elements and applying Principles — where fluency becomes automatic, accurate, and rapidly applied.

JEWELRY DESIGN PRINCIPLES:

COMPOSING, CONSTRUCTING, MANIPULATING

Some pieces of jewelry draw your attention. Others do not.

This is not a matter of happenstance. It is the result of an artist fluent in design. That fluency begins with the selection of Design Elements – the smallest meaningful units of design. But it comes to full fulfillment with the application and manipulation of Principles of Composition, Construction and Manipulation. These “organizing schemes” reflect what the individual artist wants to express, and how the individual artist anticipates how others will understand and respond to this expression.

Design Elements, which I have discussed in an earlier article ^[1], are like building blocks and function a bit like the vowel and consonant letters of the alphabet. They have form. They have meaning. They can be assembled into different arrangements which extend their meaning and usefulness in expression. Examples: color, shape, texture, point/line/plane, movement, dimensionality, and the like. Each Design Element has a set of expressive attributes. Color can be expressed as a color scheme, or as proportions, or as simultaneity effects. Shape can be geometric or dimensional or recognizable or symbolic. And so forth.

Design Elements function like a vocabulary. They represent universally accepted expressive content. Visualize the analogy between design elements and vocabulary. Picture a “t”, perhaps combined with an “h”, and then with an “e”. Or, picture the difficulty in trying to combine a “th” with a “z”. Or, still yet, picture how the “c” in “cat” is pronounced differently than the “c” in “sense”, yet still recognized as a “c”. In similar ways, the artist might decide to use the design elements of “color” and “line,” and combine them to yield another design element of “movement.” Literacy begins with the ability to decode, and this ability centers on the selection and use of Design Elements.

Principles of Composition, Construction and Manipulation function more like a grammar. Given the Design Elements selected by the artist, Principles represent organizing strategies to which the artist resorts when attempting to achieve a piece that will be seen as both “finished” and “successful”, both by the artist, as well as that artist’s audience. The artist might arrange several design elements and their expressive attributes to yield a higher level organizing principle. For example, the artist might combine color(intensity)+line(direction)+

shape( geometry)+placement(symmetry)+balance+material” to yield a sense of “rhythm.”

To continue our analogy with vocabulary, grammar and literacy, picture our “t”, “h” and “e” put together to form a full word like ”thesaurus”, then expanded into an idea, like “teachers like to use a thesaurus”, and further expressed, in anticipation of a response, to something like “but students hate when the teacher asks them to use a thesaurus.”

Literacy goes beyond decoding; it includes a fluency in how the Design Elements are organized to evoke an emotional response. This involves an intuitive understanding of Principles of Composition, Construction and Manipulation, and how to apply them. While Design Elements are selected primarily based on shared, more universal understandings of what they express, often, Principles are applied in ways more reflective of artist’s hand, and its subjective expression.

The successful jewelry designer has developed a fluency in the Disciplinary Literacy of jewelry design. Fluency is the ability of the designer to select and connect Design Elements smoothly, in visually and functionally and situationally appropriate ways with understanding. The idea of understanding is broadly defined, to include the artist’s personal goals for expression, as well as the expectations of all the audiences – the wearer, the viewer, the buyer, the seller, the student, the master. The better designer achieves a level of disciplinary literacy where fluency becomes automatic, accurate, and rapidly applied.

This Disciplinary Literacy in jewelry design has a structure all its own. There are four main components to it:

1) Vocabulary: Design Elements As The Basis Of Composition

2) Grammar: Principles of Composition, Construction and Manipulation

3) Strategy: Project Management^[2]

4) Context/Culture: Shared Understandings^[3]

This article focuses on the second component – Principles.

What Are Principles of Composition, Construction and Manipulation?

Jewelry Design is the strategic application of basic principles of organization and expression to achieve a piece which evokes emotion, resonates, and is appealing as it is worn. Traditionally the art and design worlds referred to these as “Principles of Composition.” Often artists and designers get tripped up on the word Principles, and jewelry designers get a bit confused or frustrated with the word Composition.

The use of the word “Principles” in art and design can be somewhat confusing. These Principles do not represent a set of universal, dependable and repeatable standards to strive for, which we might assume, at first.

A different meaning about “Principles” applies here. A Principle is an organizing scheme as a way to combine design elements into a more pleasing whole composition. The design elements include things which are visual effects; but, for jewelry designers, they also include things which functional, as well as things which are more social, psychological, cultural and situational. Principles inform artists in their expressive, authentic performances. Every artist is expected to apply these Principles, but only in ways the artist chooses. There might be better or worse ways to apply them, but no right or wrong ways.

Another aspect of confusion is the use of the word “Composition”. I’ve expanded the phrase, though somewhat awkwardly, to “Principles of Composition, Construction and Manipulation.” The traditional art and design idea of “composition” covers two very different types of jewelry design literacy skills under a single label, namely decoding (Design Elements) and fluency (Principles). The better jewelry designer needs to learn and apply both aspects of disciplinary literacy, but each involves different ways of thinking. As a teacher, both require different sets of strategies for training and educating jewelry designers.

Jewelry designers, by the nature of jewelry, have to deal equally with functional aspects of design, not just artistic composition. Traditional Principles of Composition need to be re-oriented for the jewelry artist to be more sensitive to the more architectural aspects of design. Design choices are also best understood at the boundary between the art of design and the body it adorns.

Limited to the idea of composition, jewelry might be judged successful as “art”, as if it was displayed on a mannequin or easel. But jewelry, in reality, can only be judged as a constructive, manipulated result situated at the boundary between art and body; that is, jewelry can only be judged as “art as it is worn.”

In this article, I focus on Principles of Composition, Construction and Manipulation. The Principles, as organizing schemes, are intertwined, and, the use of one will often depend on another. Movement might be achieved by the placement of lines, which might also establish a rhythm. Such placement of lines might be symmetrically balanced, with line thinness and thickness statistically distributed evenly through the piece.

These organizing and arranging schemes might include:

the Positioning and/or Ordering of things (white/black/white/black vs. black/black/black/white)
the Volume or Area the piece takes up (one row of beads vs. 3 rows of beads)
the Scale and Size of the pieces (6mm 6mm 6mm vs. 10mm 10mm 10mm)
the Colors, Textures and Patterns of individual pieces, and/or sets or groupings of pieces (matte/matte/shiny/matte/matte vs. shiny/shiny/matte/shiny/shiny)
the Forms (identifiable sets of pieces, highly integrated)
the Materials
the interplay of Light, Dark, Shadow, Reflection and Refraction (dark/dark/transparent/dark/dark vs. transparent/transparent/dark/transparent/transparent)

the clasp assembly and other supporting systems

Some of these design Principles are applied in similar ways to all art forms, such as painting and sculpture, no matter what the medium.

For other Principles, jewelry creates its own challenges, because all jewelry places some different demands and expectations on the artist than painting or sculpture does. Jewelry…

functions in a 3-dimensional space, particularly sensitive to position, volume and scale
must stand on its own as an object of art
but must also exist as an object of art which interacts with the body, movement, personality, and quirks of the wearer
serves many purposes, some aesthetic, some functional, some social, cultural or situational
has a much more integrated and inter-dependent relationship of the center piece, strap, fringe, edge, bail and surface embellishment – an arrangement that traditional Art theory rejects. Art sees the center piece as the “art”, and these other things as supporting, not artistic details, like a frame for a painting or a pedestal for a sculpture.

Good jewelry should exude an energy. It should resonate. This energy results from how the artist applies these Principles to compose with, construct and manipulate light and shadow, and their characteristics of warmth and cold, receding and approaching, bright and dull, light and dark. The artist’s piece is judged on whether the resulting piece feels coherent, organized, controlled, and strategically designed, again, as the jewelry is worn. Successful application of these Principles results in a piece which feels finished and successful.

The Principles include,

Rhythm
Pointers
Linear and Planar Relationships
Interest
Statistical Distribution
Balance
Forms, Their Proportions, Distributions and Dimensionality
Temporal Extension: Time and Place
Physical Extension: Functionality
Parsimony (something similar to, but a little beyond harmony and unity)

TABLE OF PRINCIPLES

Principles of Composition, Construction, and Manipulation *(Organizing Schemes)*	What the Principle is About	How Principle Might Get Expressed as Organizing Schema
*Rhythm*	This is how the piece leads the viewer through sequences of steps. It is a measure of the degree the piece engages the viewer’s eye. There is a continuance, a flow or a feeling of movement from one place of the piece to another.	Repetition Pattern Random Regular Alternating Flowing Progressive Vertical, Horizontal, Diagonal, Overlapping, Piercing Placement
*Pointers*	Pointers are places of emphasis, dominance or focus. Certain elements assume more importance than others within the same composition.	Isolating Directional Contrast Anomaly Leading Convergence Size, Weight, Color Gradient Framing Focusing and Depth Absence Implied
*Linear and Planar Relationships*	The degree the piece is not disorienting; obvious what is “up” and what is “down”. Orienting and Directional	Straight or Curved 2-D or 3D Violating, Crossing or Intersecting, Interpenetrating Parallel or Aligned Perpendicular Angular or Diagonal Vector Fixed, Directional, Infinite, or Disappearing Continuous, Broken or Perforated Radial At Edges or Within; Framed or Bound Thin or Thick Textured or Smooth Opaque or Transparent Moving, Rotating, Spinning, Darting, Flashing Silhouette
*Interest*	The degree the artist has made the ordinary…”noteworthy”	Add variety Give person an experience Vibrance, Intensity Unexpected use or positioning Surprise Sense of strength or fragility Symbolic meaning Perspective Inspirational Pattern Clash Juxtaposition Simultaneity effects
*Statistical Distribution*	How satisfying the numbers* and sizes and measures of objects within the piece are*	Equality, Equity, Equal Weight, Mass, Volume, Visual Effect (or the opposite of equality) Randomness Color proportions Scale Measurements Numbers of
*Balance*	How satisfying the placement* of objects (and their attributes) is*	Equilibrium in Weight, Mass, Volume, Visual Effect Symmetry or Asymmetry Pattern or No Pattern Regular or Irregular Equalizing visual forces Scale Permanent, Illusory, Contingent Placement, Alignment, Proximity, Repetition Radial Identical or Similar
Forms, Their Proportions, Distributions, and Dimensionality	Jewelry often can be structured in terms of segments, components or forms. How the pieces get interconnected or amassed is of concern.	Unique, Singular, Parallel/Symmetrical, Repeated, Multiple Evolving Variety Segmentation 2-D or 3-D Realistic or Abstract Geometric or Organic Complete or Incomplete Layering, Overlapping Fringing, Surface Embellishment Continuity Coordinating Clashing, Off-putting
*Temporal Extension: Time and Place*	Any piece of jewelry must be acceptable within a certain historical, social, cultural or situational context.	Visual Expectation Materials Expectation Techniques/Technology Expectation Referents, Inscriptions, Images Symbolism Themes Rule-bound or not Revival style or Contemporized Traditional style Appropriateness/Relevance to situation or context Coordination with situation or context
*Physical Extension: Functionality*	The degree the piece is designed so that it accommodates physical stresses when the piece is worn	Jointedness and Support (links, rivets, hinges, loops, unglued knots, and the like) Drape, Flow, Movement (built-in features allowing adjustment to body shape or body movement) Length, Fit Adjustability Choices of stringing material or assembly strategy Clasp Assembly (how piece attached to clasp) Strap, Bail, Pendant, Fringe, Embellishment Stiffness, Looseness, Bending, Conforming Inclusion of technology Structural Integrity Application of architectural principles of construction Physical mechanics Weight-bearing
*Parsimony (something similar to but beyond harmony and unity)*	There should be no nonessential elements; the addition or subtraction of one element or its attribute will make the piece less satisfying	Length, Volume, Mass, Weight, Visual Effects Goodness of fit Sufficient balance between unity and variety to evoke an emotional response and resonance An economy in the use of resources A result which feels finished and successful, reflecting the artist’s hand, as well as an anticipation of shared understandings among all audiences – viewer, wearer, buyer, seller, student, master

THE PRINCIPLES IN MORE DETAIL

1. Rhythm

Movement is the path our eyes follow when we look at a work of art, and it is generally very important to keep a viewer’s eyes engaged in the work. Without movement, artwork becomes stagnant. A few good strategies to evoke a sense of movement (among many others) are using diagonal lines, placing shapes so that the extend beyond the boundaries of the picture plane, and using changing values.

Rhythm is one Principle used to shape the viewer’s experience with the piece. Rhythm is how the piece leads the viewer through sequences of steps. It is a measure of the degree the piece engages the viewer’s eye.

There is a continuance, a flow or a feeling of movement from one place of the piece to another.

Repetition and pattern are key here. The artist might achieve a rhythm by varying or repeating colors, textures, sizes, forms. The rhythm might be slow, fast, predictable, random, staccato, measured, safe, edgy, and so forth. The intervals between repetitions and patterns can create a sense of rhythm in the viewer and a sense of movement. Repetitions and patterns can be random, regular, alternating, flowing, progressive – there are many directions the artist can go in establishing a rhythm.

When a piece has multiple and coordinated rhythms, we call this Symphonic Rhythm. For example, in a piece, there might be a clear rhythm set by the use of colors throughout the piece, as well as the positioning of definable forms, such as a series of beaded leaves or other shapes.

The Rhythm should assist the viewer in cognitively making a complete circle around the piece. You don’t want the viewer to lose interest, get bored, or fall flat, before the eye and brain can make that complete circle.

Example:

Black-o-Black-o-Black-o-White-o-Black-o-Black-o-Black-o-White-o
Or,

Black-o-White-o-Black-o-White-o-Black-o-White-o-Black-o-White-o

The better designer can empower the design, if using Rhythm in the right way.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

2. Pointers

Pointers are places of emphasis, dominance or focus. Certain elements assume more importance than others within the same composition.

Pointers guide the viewer to a specific place, or focal point. Cognitively, you want to create the place for the eye/brain to come to rest.

Examples:

Something can be centered
The color can be varied, say from dark to light, to serve as an “arrow” or “Pointer” to a section of the necklace
The positioning of the clasp might serve as a pointer
A dangling pendant might serve as a pointer
The size of the beads can be varied, such as smallest to largest, to serve as an “arrow” or “Pointer”
Coordinating the placement of Focal Point on jewelry with the pattern in the clothing upon which the piece will rest
Something can be strategically off-centered.

The better designer is able to capture the viewer’s attention to more important parts of the piece.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

3. Linear and Planar Relationships

This is the degree the piece is not disorienting to the viewer, or particularly confusing in terms of what is up and what is down.

People always need to orient themselves to their surroundings, so that they know what is up and what is down. They usually do this by recognizing the horizontal planes of the floor and the ceiling of a room (ground and sky outside), and the vertical planes of the walls of a room (buildings, trees and the like outside).

Jewelry must assist, or at least not get in the way, of this natural orienting process. It accomplishes this in how its “lines” are arranged and organized. If a piece is very 3-dimensional, then how its “planes” are arranged and organized becomes important, as well.

Design elements we might use to achieve a satisfactory planar relationship within our piece:

– a strategic use of lines and planes

— shapes

— boundaries

– -silhouettes

— contours

– symmetry

– or, more difficult to achieve, a satisfying asymmetry

– a planar pattern in how each section of the piece relates to the other sections

– how sections of the piece interlock

– how we “draw and interrelate” parallel lines/planes, perpendicular lines/planes and curved lines/planes within the piece

Example:

How can a person truly pull off wearing only one earring? After all, visually, it pulls the person off to one side, thus violating the basic orienting planar relationships. What about the composition of the earring, allows this to work; what about the composition doesn’t?

Example:

Wearing a necklace, where the clasp is worn on the side, instead of the back. Again, what about the composition of the necklace, allows this to work; what about the composition doesn’t?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
4. Interest

“Interest” means the degree to which the artist makes the ordinary…noteworthy.

Here the artist demonstrates how to balance off and control “variety” with “unity” and “harmony”. Without unity and harmony, the piece becomes chaotic. Without variety, the piece becomes boring, monotonous and uninteresting.

Arranging and organizing Design Elements might involve:
– selection of materials and mix of materials

– selection of color combinations

– varying the sizes of things

– pushing the envelop on interrelating planar relationships among the sections of the jewelry

– playing with the rhythm

– clever use of a focal point

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

5. Statistical Distribution

The artist is always concerned with the number or size or scale or measurement of things. This principle focuses on these statistics. With this principle, we are not concerned with the placement or balance of things – just the numbers and measurements.

We ask: How pleasing and satisfying are the selection of the numbers, sizes, proportions, volumes/weights, and color/textures of objects the artist wants to use in the piece. The artist might, at this point, anticipate creating a pattern, or not.

Examples:

BIG-o-BIG-o-small-o-BIG-o-BIG-o-small-o-

PURPLE-o-PURPLE-o-PURPLE-o-YELLOW-o-PURPLE-o-YELLOW-o-

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

6. Balance

Balance has to do with placement. How pleasing or satisfying is the placement of objects (and their attributes) within a piece?

Usually, the designer is trying to achieve a feeling of equality in weight, attention or attraction of the various visual design elements. The design attributes would include such things as the positioning or relative positioning of the materials used, the colors, textures and patterns, the sizes and scales.

The artist might play with placement in terms of proximity, alignment or repetition.

There are different types of balance.

(1) symmetry: the use of identical compositional units on either side of a vertical axis

(2) approximate symmetry: the use of similarly balanced compositional units on either side of a vertical axis

(3) radial symmetry: an even, radiating out from a central point to all four quadrants (directions) of the shape’s plane (surface)

(4) asymmetry: even though the compositional units are not identical on either side of a vertical axis, there is a “felt” equilibrium of the total piece. Often, with jewelry, this equilibrium depends on what clothes or other jewelry the person is wearing, or something about that person’s body/body shape.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

7. Forms, Their Proportions, Distributions and Dimensionality

Jewelry often can be structured in terms of segments, components or forms. How are pieces interconnected or amassed? Is this achieved through optical effects or reality?

The designer is concerned with managing these structures in terms of proportions, distributions and/or dimensionality. The artist makes choices about how each part relates to the whole in terms of scale or relevance.

The artist might play with things like:
Layering

Surface embellishment

Fringing

Curvature

Overlapping planes

Balance

The better designer creates pieces where the whole is greater than the sum of the parts.

Example:

Flat loomed bracelet and a button clasp, that sits so high on the bracelet, that it detracts from the 2-dimensional reason-for-being of the piece.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

8. Temporal Extension: Time and Place

Any piece of jewelry must be acceptable within a certain historical, social, cultural or situational context.

For example, is a piece appropriate for a wedding also appropriate for office wear? Is a great University of Tennessee Orange Necklace as successful when worn to a Vanderbilt football game?

Temporal Extension may narrowly refer to one specific wearer in particular, or more broadly to group, situational, social or societal expectations.

Other examples:

white pearls are associated with bridal jewelry
using metalized plastic beads, where the plating chips off in a short period of time, should not be used in an heirloom bracelet
making a matching set of earrings and necklace for jewelry that typically should be worn as a matching set
gifting a carved jade pendant with an message-word carving inappropriate for the religion of the person receiving it

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

9. Physical Extension: Functionality

Any piece of jewelry must be functional when worn.

Functionality has to do with such things as movement, drape, comfort, flow and durability. The piece of jewelry needs to feel comfortable when worn, always look good on the wearer no matter what the wearer is doing, and be durable. This involves a lot of building in understandings of physical mechanics and architectural principles of construction.

When there is (or should be) movement in a piece, there should be clear evidence that the designer anticipated where the parts came from, and where they are going to. Jewelry is worn by people who move, so the design should be a natural physical extension to such movements, and the stress they put on the piece.

For example, in a necklace, the clasp should remain on the neck, even as the beadwork moves with the person, without the necklace turning around on the neck, or breaking.

Example: The dangle earring which has the dangle stuck in a 90 degree angle.

Example: The crimped bracelet which breaks at the crimp.

Example: The bracelet too tight when the design is turned into a circle placed around the wrist

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

10. Parsimony
(something similar to, but a little bit beyond harmony and unity)

At the point where the piece is judged to be finished and successful, there should be no nonessential elements. When the piece is finished and successful, it should evoke emotions and resonate.

The designer should achieve the maximal effect with the least effort or excess.

There is a tendency of beaders and jewelry makers to over-do:

– over-embellish the surface

– add too much fringe

– repeat themes and design elements too often

– use too many colors

Parsimony vs. Unity

In art, the traditional measure of completion and success was a feeling or sense of “Unity.” Unity signified how everything felt all right. All the Design Elements used, and how they were coordinated and placed, were very coherent, clear, harmonious and satisfying.

I think the idea of unity begins to get at the place we want to end up. But this concept is not concrete enough for me. You can have unity, but the piece still seen as boring when there is no variety. This condition is unacceptable as a principled outcome of jewelry construction. Finished and successful jewelry should evoke emotions and resonate. You can have unity, but the assessments rely too much on universal, objective perceptions of design elements and their attributes. The artist, the wearer, and the situation are too easily left out of the equation.

Jewelry creation usually demands a series of judgment calls and tradeoffs between aesthetics and functionality, artist goals and audience understandings and expectations, a full palette of colors, shapes and textures and a very limited one. A measure of completeness and success needs to result from the forced choice decisions of the artist. It needs to account for the significance of the results, not just the organization of them. It needs to explain the Why, not just the What.

For me, the more appropriate concept here is “Parsimony.” Parsimony is sometimes referred to in art and design as “Economy”, but the idea of economy is reserved for the visual effects. For jewelry designers, we want that economy or parsimony to apply to functional and situational effects, as well. When the finished and successful piece is parsimonious, the relationship of all the Design Elements and their expressed attributes will be so strong, that to add or remove any one thing would diminish, not just the design, but rather the significance of the design.

Parsimony…

– forces explanation; its forced-choice nature is most revealing about the artist’s understandings and intentions

– relies on evidence moreso than assumptions to get at criticality

– focuses examination of the few elements that make a difference

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

THINKING ROUTINE^[4]: LOOK – SCORE – EXPLAIN

LOOK:

CLASSICISM NECKLACE

Warren Feld, 2001.

Materials and Description:

Three strands, druk rondelles Czech glass, in matte amethyst, matte olivine, and matte topaz. Center, overlapping agate stones.

At the center, each of the three strands pass through a 3-hole separator bar, and through one of three thin sterling silver tubes.

The centerpiece stones slide over the top and bottom tubes. The middle tube is sandwiched between the stones. These stones can spin around on the tubes, allowing them to adjust to body shape and movement, but the middle tube restricts the movement to maintain the general visual appearance as in the image.

S-clasp in back.

KEY DESIGN ELEMENTS:

(see key at bottom of table for list)

COLOR

BALANCE AND DISTRIBUTION
SHAPE
POINT/LINE/PLANE

MATERIALS

MOVEMENT

DIMENSIONALITY

TECHNIQUE/TECHNOLOGY

KEY ATTRIBUTES OF DESIGN ELEMENTS:

1a. Some Tonal quality and finish

1b. Split Complementary color scheme

1c. Gradation dark to light

2a. Symmetry

3a. Same size druk rondelles

4a. Strong lines core design feature

4b. Overlapping centerpiece stones establishes 2 planes; can move but restricted from violating planes

5a. Mixing glass, metal and gemstone

6a. Center stones allowed to spin on tubes

7a. Layering of center stones

8a. Unexpected connection of strap to centerpiece

SCORE:

SCORE CARD ON PRINCIPLES:

DESIGN CRITERIA	Very Unsatisfying…….Very Satisfying
1. Rhythm	1 2 3 4 5
2. Pointers	1 2 3 4 5
3. Linear and Planar Relationships	1 2 3 4 5
4. Interest	1 2 3 4 5
5. Statistical Distribution	1 2 3 4 5
6. Balance	1 2 3 4 5
7. Forms	1 2 3 4 5
8. Temporal Extension: Time, Place	1 2 3 4 5
9. Physical Extension: Functionality	1 2 3 4 5
10. Parsimony	1 2 3 4 5

EXPLAIN:

RHYTHM:

How you see this playing out in this piece:

One smooth flow from clasp to centerpiece down straps

ESTABLISHED BY KEY DESIGN ELEMENTS:

BALANCE AND DISTRIBUTION

POINTERS

WHAT DESIGN CHOICES MIGHT WEAKEN OR STRENGTHEN THIS….

(examples: change length, shapes, lines, bead size, bead color, bead placement)

Weaken: Mixing different sizes; adding more colors within each strand; changing length

WHAT IF CONTINGENCIES…

(examples: If cannot get some bead, color, size, finish, clasp, what could you resort to instead)

If cannot get any one of 3 colors or finishes or sizes, would have to change to 3 different split complementary colors and new stones for focal point

POINTERS:

How you see this playing out in this piece:

Overlapping stones in centerpiece

ESTABLISHED BY KEY DESIGN ELEMENTS:

POINT/LINE/PLANE

WHAT DESIGN CHOICES MIGHT WEAKEN OR STRENGTHEN THIS….

(examples: change length, shapes, lines, bead size, bead color, bead placement)

Strengthen: better color coordination between center piece and straps

Weaken: mix colors/sizes in strap; change rhythm in strap; add patterns

WHAT IF CONTINGENCIES…

(examples: If cannot get some bead, color, size, finish, clasp, what could you resort to instead)

Would need to have alternative gemstones, similar sizing to original, color coordinated with strap colors

LINEAR/PLANAR RELATIONSHIPS:

How you see this playing out in this piece:

Strong sense of line and downward direction towards centerpiece, represented by 3 strands, strong implementation of 3-color scheme

Overlapping planes in centerpiece

ESTABLISHED BY KEY DESIGN ELEMENTS:

POINT/LINE/PLANE

STRUCTURE/SUPPORT

WHAT DESIGN CHOICES MIGHT WEAKEN OR STRENGTHEN THIS….

(examples: change length, shapes, lines, bead size, bead color, bead placement)

Weaken: have less fluid structure support connecting one side through centerpiece to other side; have only one center stone rather than two which overlap

WHAT IF CONTINGENCIES…

(examples: If cannot get some bead, color, size, finish, clasp, what could you resort to instead)

If hole in center stones not big enough to slide over sterling silver tube, would have to make holes larger, find thinner tubes or alternative stones

INTEREST:

How you see this playing out in this piece:

Overlapping stones in centerpiece

Structure of tubes and stones in centerpiece, particularly in terms of allowing and restricting movement

ESTABLISHED BY KEY DESIGN ELEMENTS:

POINT/LINE/PLANE

MATERIAL

MOVEMENT

STRUCTURE/SUPPORT

WHAT DESIGN CHOICES MIGHT WEAKEN OR STRENGTHEN THIS….

(examples: change length, shapes, lines, bead size, bead color, bead placement)

Weaken: no overlap stones and no movement; put pattern or change bead sizes in strap

WHAT IF CONTINGENCIES…

(examples: If cannot get some bead, color, size, finish, clasp, what could you resort to instead)

If could not create the structure creating the overlapping stone centerpiece, use a centerpiece with some dimension that supports the rhythm of the piece.

STATISTICAL DISTRIBUTION:

How you see this playing out in this piece:

One shape and size of bead in the 3 straps.

Single color within each strand.

ESTABLISHED BY KEY DESIGN ELEMENTS:

SHAPE

COLOR

WHAT DESIGN CHOICES MIGHT WEAKEN OR STRENGTHEN THIS….

(examples: change length, shapes, lines, bead size, bead color, bead placement)

Weaken: vary shape or add more colors

WHAT IF CONTINGENCIES…

(examples: If cannot get some bead, color, size, finish, clasp, what could you resort to instead)

If could not get enough beads in specific size, shape, color for each strap, come up with different design.

BALANCE:

How you see this playing out in this piece:

Single color in each strand

Symmetry

Repeated same length in each strand

ESTABLISHED BY KEY DESIGN ELEMENTS:

BALANCE/DISTRIBUTION

POINT/LINE/PLANE

FORM/SEGMENTS/COMPONENTS

WHAT DESIGN CHOICES MIGHT WEAKEN OR STRENGTHEN THIS….

(examples: change length, shapes, lines, bead size, bead color, bead placement)

Weaken: Make piece unbalanced, or asymmetrical

WHAT IF CONTINGENCIES…

(examples: If cannot get some bead, color, size, finish, clasp, what could you resort to instead)

If could not restrict the movement of the center stones, would lose visual balance; would have to come up with different strategy for restricting movement, or just use one, rather than two stones.

FORMS:

How you see this playing out in this piece:

Clear forms:

– 3 strands, one of each color

– clear sense of right side and left side and center

– segmented centerpiece

ESTABLISHED BY KEY DESIGN ELEMENTS:

FORM/SEGMENTS/COMPONENTS

COLOR

BALANCE/DISTRIBUTION

POINTER

WHAT DESIGN CHOICES MIGHT WEAKEN OR STRENGTHEN THIS….

(examples: change length, shapes, lines, bead size, bead color, bead placement)

Weaken: create a size or color pattern in the straps; additional segmentation

WHAT IF CONTINGENCIES…

(examples: If cannot get some bead, color, size, finish, clasp, what could you resort to instead)

If could not get enough beads in specific size, shape, color for each strap, come up with different design or color scheme.

TEMPORAL EXTENSION:

How you see this playing out in this piece:

Piece has a classical elegance to it. Can picture it worn in a more upscale social setting like a banquet or dinner party.

ESTABLISHED BY KEY DESIGN ELEMENTS:

FORMS/SEGMENTS/COMPONENTS

COLOR

BALANCE/DISTRIBUTION

BEAUTY/APPEAL

CONTEXT/SITUATION/CULTURE

WHAT DESIGN CHOICES MIGHT WEAKEN THIS….

(examples: change length, shapes, lines, bead size, bead color, bead placement)

Weaken: brighter or primary colors; glossy color finishes; shorter or longer length

WHAT IF CONTINGENCIES…

(examples: If cannot get some bead, color, size, finish, clasp, what could you resort to instead)

If could not get enough beads in specific size, shape, color for each strap, come up with different design or color scheme.

PHYSICAL EXTENSION:

How you see this playing out in this piece:

The support structure for the centerpiece which both allows and restricts movement.

The 3 strands on each side of the necklace can move independently and allow better movement, drape and flow.

ESTABLISHED BY KEY DESIGN ELEMENTS:

STRUCTURE/SUPPORT

TECHNIQUE/TECHNOLOGY

WHAT DESIGN CHOICES MIGHT WEAKEN OR STRENGTHEN THIS….

(examples: change length, shapes, lines, bead size, bead color, bead placement)

Weaken: leave out middle tube which lays between top and bottom center stone; connect the 3 strands together at two or more places along their length.

WHAT IF CONTINGENCIES…

(examples: If cannot get some bead, color, size, finish, clasp, what could you resort to instead)

If could not get support structure to work, come up with different design.

PARSIMONY:

How you see this playing out in this piece:

The choice of colors, materials, bead sizes, length of strands, symmetry

ESTABLISHED BY KEY DESIGN ELEMENTS:

SHAPE

COLOR

POINT/LINE/PLANE

MOVEMENT

FORMS/SEGMENTS/COMPONENTS

BALANCE/DISTRIBUTION

MATERIAL

WHAT DESIGN CHOICES MIGHT WEAKEN OR STRENGTHEN THIS….

(examples: change length, shapes, lines, bead size, bead color, bead placement)

Weaken: change any color, material, bead size, length, symmetry

WHAT IF CONTINGENCIES…

(examples: If cannot get some bead, color, size, finish, clasp, what could you resort to instead)

If did not have sufficient access to these resources, would have to come up with a different design.

*KEY DESIGN ELEMENTS:*
COLOR	MOVEMENT	BALANCE / DISTRIBUTION	DIMENSIONALITY
SHAPE	COLOR BLENDING	REFERENTS	FORM, SEGMENTS, COMPONENTS
TEXTURE/PATTERN	THEME/SYMBOLS	CONTEXT, SITUATION, CULTURE	CRAFTSMANSHIP
POINT/LINE/PLANE	BEAUTY, APPEAL	NEGATIVE , POSITIVE SPACES	TECHNIQUE/TECHNOLOGY
MATERIAL	STRUCTURE, SUPPORT	LIGHT, SHADOW

LOOK:

THE BLUE WATERFALL NECKLACE

Warren Feld, 2001.

Materials and Description:

Mix of glass, crystal, and sterling silver beads.

Each segment of beads has a different number of bead, and different sizes/color/finish of beads within it.

The colors are not part of a color scheme, and would be seen to clash if compared one to one outside of their use in the bracelet. Example: sapphire blues and montana blues; golds and silvers; matte and glossy.

The segments nearer the clasp are shorter than those further from the clasp.

The sterling silver tubes are all curved.

There is no focal point per se.

The clasp is an adjustable hook and eye choker clasp.

KEY DESIGN ELEMENTS:

(see key at bottom of table for list)

COLOR

COLOR BLENDING

BALANCE AND DISTRIBUTION
POINT/LINE/PLANE
MOVEMENT
SHAPE

STRUCTURE / SUPPORT

FORM /SEGMENTS/ COMPONENTS

KEY ATTRIBUTES OF DESIGN ELEMENTS:

1a. No conformance to color scheme, though leans toward the monochromatic

2a. Simultaneity effects

3a. Feels balanced though there the distribution of sizes, numbers and segment lengths varies within each strand and between each strand

4a. Brings your eye down to a central place, but no specific focal point

4b. Curved lines distort the linearity

5a. Expresses feeling of moving water, but no moving parts

6a. Curved tubes key element

6b. Bead of different shapes

7a. Adjustable choker clasp allows wearer to adjust necklace to body, to achieve that optimum sense of balance and movement

8a. Consists of each length segments separating unequal length segments.

8b. Important that segments on both strands do not match up with each other, but feel staggered

8c. Important that no segment shows dominance or becomes a clear focal point.

SCORE:

SCORE CARD ON PRINCIPLES:

DESIGN CRITERIA	Very Unsatisfying…….Very Satisfying
1. Rhythm	1 2 3 4 5
2. Pointers	1 2 3 4 5
3. Linear and Planar Relationships	1 2 3 4 5
4. Interest	1 2 3 4 5
5. Statistical Distribution	1 2 3 4 5
6. Balance	1 2 3 4 5
7. Forms	1 2 3 4 5
8. Temporal Extension: Time, Place	1 2 3 4 5
9. Physical Extension: Functionality	1 2 3 4 5
10. Parsimony	1 2 3 4 5

EXPLAIN:

RHYTHM:

How you see this playing out in this piece:

The forms or segments alternate between clusters of beads and a curved sterling silver tube.

The length of each bead cluster varies, with longer clusters furthest from the clasp.

Staggered alignment of forms.

The perceived “weight” of the left side seems the same as the perceived “weight” of the right side.

ESTABLISHED BY KEY DESIGN ELEMENTS:

FORM, SEGMENTS, COMPONENTS

BALANCE, DISTRIBUTION

WHAT DESIGN CHOICES MIGHT WEAKEN OR STRENGTHEN THIS….

(examples: change length, shapes, lines, bead size, bead color, bead placement)

Weaken: making every bead cluster the same length and the same assortment of beads; having a clear focal point; using straight rather than curved tubes; having forms in both strands align more tightly.

WHAT IF CONTINGENCIES…

(examples: If cannot get some bead, color, size, finish, clasp, what could you resort to instead)

Can’t get curved sterling silver tubes, will need to find alternative, either plated, or different sizes

POINTERS:

How you see this playing out in this piece:

There is no specific pointer per se, but piece feels as if it has a definite top and bottom, and brings your eye downward.

ESTABLISHED BY KEY DESIGN ELEMENTS:

POINT, LINE, PLANE

BALANCE, DISTRIBUTION

WHAT DESIGN CHOICES MIGHT WEAKEN OR STRENGTHEN THIS….

(examples: change length, shapes, lines, bead size, bead color, bead placement)

Weaken: Adding too much color/size variation within each cluster of beads.

WHAT IF CONTINGENCIES…

(examples: If cannot get some bead, color, size, finish, clasp, what could you resort to instead)

If desired effect of a waterfall was achieved, would have to rethink the piece.

LINEAR/PLANAR RELATIONSHIPS:

How you see this playing out in this piece:

Piece dependent on staggered clustering of points and connecting curved lines.

The two strands and the forms suggest a greater dimensionality than 2-D.

ESTABLISHED BY KEY DESIGN ELEMENTS:

POINT, LINE, PLANE

FORMS, SEGMENTS, COMPONENTS

WHAT DESIGN CHOICES MIGHT WEAKEN OR STRENGTHEN THIS….

(examples: change length, shapes, lines, bead size, bead color, bead placement)

Weaken: making relationship of parts more consistent, including using straight lines rather than curves; lining up the two strands more symmetrically

WHAT IF CONTINGENCIES…

(examples: If cannot get some bead, color, size, finish, clasp, what could you resort to instead)

If piece felt too flat, work more with sizes and shapes of beads in each cluster.

INTEREST:

How you see this playing out in this piece:

Piece evokes feeling of a waterfall.

Piece feels finished and successful.

ESTABLISHED BY KEY DESIGN ELEMENTS:

COLOR BLENDING

FORM, SEGMENTS, COMPONENTS

SHAPE

TEXTURE, PATTERN

BALANCE, DISTRIBUTION

LIGHT, SHADOW

DIMENSIONALITY

WHAT DESIGN CHOICES MIGHT WEAKEN OR STRENGTHEN THIS….

(examples: change length, shapes, lines, bead size, bead color, bead placement)

Weaken: making piece longer or shorter; making forms more consistent in size and design; giving piece clear focal point

WHAT IF CONTINGENCIES…

(examples: If cannot get some bead, color, size, finish, clasp, what could you resort to instead)

The bead colors are carefully matched and coordinated through simultaneity effects. If cannot get same beads, near very close substitutes, or need to redesign cluster from start.

STATISTICAL DISTRIBUTION:

How you see this playing out in this piece:

Selection of colors, sizes and shapes within and across bead clusters.

Numbers of clusters and numbers of sterling silver curved tubes.

ESTABLISHED BY KEY DESIGN ELEMENTS:

POINT, LINE, PLANE

BALANCE, DISTRIBUTION

WHAT DESIGN CHOICES MIGHT WEAKEN OR STRENGTHEN THIS….

(examples: change length, shapes, lines, bead size, bead color, bead placement)

Weaken: more consistency in size, shape, color, form

WHAT IF CONTINGENCIES…

(examples: If cannot get some bead, color, size, finish, clasp, what could you resort to instead)

The bead colors and sizes are carefully matched and coordinated through simultaneity effects. If cannot get same beads, near very close substitutes, or need to redesign cluster from start.

BALANCE:

How you see this playing out in this piece:

Piece feels balanced, although the forms do not line up, and in reality are made up of different colors/shapes/sizes of beads.

Shorter clusters of beads near clasp; longer near bottom of necklace.

ESTABLISHED BY KEY DESIGN ELEMENTS:

BALANCE, DISTRIBUTION

FORM, SEGMENTS, COMPONENTS

POINT, LINE, PLANE

WHAT DESIGN CHOICES MIGHT WEAKEN OR STRENGTHEN THIS….

(examples: change length, shapes, lines, bead size, bead color, bead placement)

Weaken: more consistency in size, shape, color, form

WHAT IF CONTINGENCIES…

(examples: If cannot get some bead, color, size, finish, clasp, what could you resort to instead)

If the placement of colors/shapes/sizes does not work, have to rethink the design.

FORMS:

How you see this playing out in this piece:

Two types of forms – bead clusters and single sterling silver curved tubes.

Forms vary in length and makeup.

Forms in both strands feel coordinated, but do not align or include the same or parallel colors/shapes/sizes.

ESTABLISHED BY KEY DESIGN ELEMENTS:

POINT, LINE, PLANE

FORM, SEGMENTS, COMPONENTS

WHAT DESIGN CHOICES MIGHT WEAKEN OR STRENGTHEN THIS….

(examples: change length, shapes, lines, bead size, bead color, bead placement)

Weaken: More standardizing of lengths and bead colors, shapes, sizes; changing the patterning from alternating clusters and long curved tubes, to something else

WHAT IF CONTINGENCIES…

(examples: If cannot get some bead, color, size, finish, clasp, what could you resort to instead)

Could not get curved tubes, have to rethink design.

TEMPORAL EXTENSION:

How you see this playing out in this piece:

We expect this piece can be worn both casually and formally.

Piece has a very fluid feel to it, and we expect that this sense of fluidity will always be felt, no matter where the piece is worn.

ESTABLISHED BY KEY DESIGN ELEMENTS:

REFERENTS

POINT, LINE, PLANE

FORM, SEGMENTS, COMPONENTS

WHAT DESIGN CHOICES MIGHT WEAKEN THIS….

(examples: change length, shapes, lines, bead size, bead color, bead placement)

Weaken: More standardizing of lengths and bead colors, shapes, sizes; changing the patterning from alternating clusters and long curved tubes, to something else

WHAT IF CONTINGENCIES…

(examples: If cannot get some bead, color, size, finish, clasp, what could you resort to instead)

Could not get curved tubes, have to rethink design.

PHYSICAL EXTENSION:

How you see this playing out in this piece:

Adjustable necklace clasp allows wearer to adjust the piece, so that both strands lay so that they evoke this feeling of a waterfall. Otherwise, piece would not lay right on every body shape.

ESTABLISHED BY KEY DESIGN ELEMENTS:

TECHNIQUE/TECHNOLOGY

WHAT DESIGN CHOICES MIGHT WEAKEN OR STRENGTHEN THIS….

(examples: change length, shapes, lines, bead size, bead color, bead placement)

Weaken: use of fixed clasp

WHAT IF CONTINGENCIES…

(examples: If cannot get some bead, color, size, finish, clasp, what could you resort to instead)

Could not get an adjustable choker clasp, would have to craft something to be adjustable

PARSIMONY:

How you see this playing out in this piece:

Piece is neither too short or too long.

Forms in piece do not seem to need to be longer or shorter or more consistent or less consistent.

ESTABLISHED BY KEY DESIGN ELEMENTS:

FORM, SEGMENT, COMPONENTS

POINT, LINE, PLANE

BALANCE, DISTRIBUTION

COLOR BLENDING

POINTER

WHAT DESIGN CHOICES MIGHT WEAKEN OR STRENGTHEN THIS….

(examples: change length, shapes, lines, bead size, bead color, bead placement)

Weaken: More standardizing of lengths and bead colors, shapes, sizes; changing the patterning from alternating clusters and long curved tubes, to something else; changing length or silhouette of necklace

WHAT IF CONTINGENCIES…

(examples: If cannot get some bead, color, size, finish, clasp, what could you resort to instead)

Could not achieve color blending, sense of balance, or an up-down orientation, then would need to rethink design.

*KEY DESIGN ELEMENTS:*
COLOR	MOVEMENT	BALANCE / DISTRIBUTION	DIMENSIONALITY
SHAPE	COLOR BLENDING	REFERENTS	FORM, SEGMENTS, COMPONENTS
TEXTURE/PATTERN	THEME/SYMBOLS	CONTEXT, SITUATION, CULTURE	CRAFTSMANSHIP
POINT/LINE/PLANE	BEAUTY, APPEAL	NEGATIVE , POSITIVE SPACES	TECHNIQUE/TECHNOLOGY
MATERIAL	STRUCTURE, SUPPORT	LIGHT, SHADOW

FOOTNOTES
^[1] Feld, Warren. “Jewelry Design Composition: Playing with Building Blocks Called Design Elements,” 3/17/2018
^[2] Feld, Warren. “Jewelry Design: A Managed Process,” Klimt02, 2/2/18. https://klimt02.net/forum/articles/jewelry-design-managed-process-warren-feld

^[3]Shared Understandings. In another graduate education class, the major text reviewed the differences between understanding and knowledge. The question was how to teach understanding. Worth the read to gain many insights about how to structure teaching to get sufficient understanding to enrich learning.
Understanding by Design by Grant Wiggins and Jay McTighe, 2^nd Edition, Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development, 2005.
^[4] Thinking Routines. I teach jewelry design. I find it useful to engage students with various ways of thinking out loud. They need to hear me think out loud about what choices I am making and what things I am considering when making those choices. They need to hear themselves think out loud so that they can develop strategies for getting more organized and strategic in dealing with information and making decisions. My inspiration here was based on the work done by Visible Thinking by Project Zero at Harvard Graduate School of Education .

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Posted in Art or Craft?, design management, jewelry design, jewelry making, Learn To Bead | Tagged: art, design, design management, jewelry construction, jewelry design, principles of composition | 2 Comments »

JEWELRY DESIGN COMPOSITION: Playing With Building Blocks Called Design Elements

Posted by learntobead on March 17, 2018

JEWELRY DESIGN COMPOSITION:
PLAYING WITH BUILDING BLOCKS
CALLED DESIGN ELEMENTS

by Warren Feld, Designer

Abstract:
Jewelry making is a constructive process of expression.   The language of expression begins with the idea of Design Elements.   Design Elements are the smallest, meaningful units of design. Design Elements
function in a similar way as vowels and consonants in a language.   They have form. They have meaning.   They have expression.   Some can stand alone, and others are dependent and must be clustered together. Better jewelry designers are aware of and can decode these expressive aspects of design elements and how they are included within any piece. This is one part of learning a disciplinary
literacy in design. This literacy begins with a process of decoding and builds to an intuitive fluency in design.   This article focuses on this process of decoding.

Jewelry making is a constructive process of expression.

The language of expression begins with the idea of Design Elements. Design Elements are like building blocks and function a bit like the vowel and consonant letters of the alphabet. They have form. They have meaning. They can be assembled into different arrangements which extend their meaning and usefulness in expression.

There is an underlying logic to this process – a vocabulary and grammar, so to speak. Recognizing how this vocabulary and grammar is structured and applied enables the jewelry designer to learn how to be fluent in design. Such recognition is critical in developing a coherent, consistent disciplinary literacy in jewelry design. Such disciplinary literacy is at the heart
of a professional identity for jewelry design artisans. This literacy structure in design has four main components to it:

1) Vocabulary: Design Elements As The Basis Of Composition

2) Grammar: Principles of Construction

3) Strategy: Project Management^[^1]

4) Context/Culture: Shared Understandings^[2]

This article focuses on the first component – Design Elements.

It makes sense for the designer to begin with something like building blocks, which I call Design Elements. Design Elements, like building blocks, are tangible things. They can be visualized. They can be touched and moved around. They can be combined in different arrangements. They can be used to create many types of expressions. Design Elements include things like color, shape, movement, dimensionality, materials, use of space, and the like. Design Elements are the smallest, meaningful units of design.

Not every Design Element is alike.   Color is different than Shape
is different than Texture.     Movement is different than Balance is
different than Dimensionality.    Learning about and understanding the
differentiation among Design Elements becomes very important if the jewelry designer is to have sufficient power and insight over consistency, variation, coherence and unity in their designs.    This power and insight is called decoding. Every jewelry designer needs to learn how to decode, if they are to be successful in design.

Some Design Elements are syllabic meaning they are independent
and can stand alone. Others are non-syllabic, meaning they are dependent and cannot stand alone.

INDEPENDENT DESIGN ELEMENTS

DEPENDENT DESIGN ELEMENTS

Function like vowels in alphabet

Many expressive variations

Syllabic

Can stand alone and be expressive

Expressions sensitive to placement or context

Function like consonants in alphabet

Limited expressive variations if used alone and not in combination

Non-syllabic

Do not often stand alone and more usually require an assist from
an independent design element to extend their expression

Expressions consistent, somewhat insensitive to placement or
context

Design Elements have graphic representations. Graphic representations allow these elements to be recognized symbolically as a sort of short-hand.

Each Design Element also encompasses a range of acceptable meanings, which I call expressive variations. These expressive variations, while different among themselves, are still reflective of that Design Element. They have universal qualities in that people tend to share understandings about what these expressive variations mean and how they are to be used.
Color Schemes, for example, are objective, agreed-upon combinations of colors seen as coherent and unifying. Thus, any color scheme is an expressive variation on the element of Color.

The universal, expressive variations associated with each Design Element are, in effect, attributes of that Design Element. These attributes have an
objective quality to them in that there is general agreement among designer,
viewer, wearer, buyer and seller as to what they express and how they might be used. There is an expectation that whatever role a person plays relative to the piece of jewelry, the Design Elements and their attributes will be decoded in a similar way.

At this stage in the jewelry design process, the focus is on a simple vocabulary. The vocabulary is made up of Design Elements
and their expressive attributes. The vocabulary encapsulates a generally shared understanding of its meaning and how it is to be used. It is
at the point of grammar, thus manipulation and construction, that individual artists get to show their artistic hand in selecting and placing these elements into a finished piece of jewelry.

These Design Elements and their attributes can be arranged in different configurations I call clusters.     Clusters may consist of independent Design
Elements alone, dependent Design Elements alone, or a mix of both.    For example, we may use an arrangement of glossy and matte Color beads to
project Dimensionality.    We may use different Colors of beads, rhythmically arranged, to project Movement.

Combinations of Design Elements into clusters can have different effects, from synergy, antagonism, blending, bounding, freeing and inflection.

Selecting Design Elements and clustering them does not occur in a vacuum.
The designer selects and arranges Design Elements in anticipation of how
these choices will be understood by others in a universal or objective sense.

This is a process which I call “Backwards Designing”.^[^3] The building blocks and their attributes are first selected in anticipation of these shared understandings. For instance, the designer might choose colors by anticipating how others will recognize the legitimacy and appeal of
certain clusters of colors – color schemes.

If the viewer, wearer, buyer or seller of a piece of jewelry cannot understand and relate to its Design Elements and how they are clustered within the piece, they will not understand it. They will not appreciate it. They will not see it as a legitimate piece of artistic expression. It will not
feel authentic. To others, if the piece lacks evidence of shared understandings, this will result in that jewelry (and by implication, the jewelry artisan) getting labeled, for example, as unsatisfying or boring or ugly or monotonous.

DESIGN ELEMENTS COMPRISE A VOCABULARY
OF BASIC ARTISTIC EXPRESSION

Working with Design Elements is not much different than working with an alphabet.

An alphabet is made up of different letters. Each letter has different
attributes – how it is written, how it sounds, how it is used. Configurations of letters result in more sounds and more meanings and more ways to be used.

A person working with an alphabet has to be able to decode the letters, sounds and meanings, as letters are used individually as well as in combination. As the speaker becomes better at decoding, she or he begins to build in understanding of implications for how any letter is used, again, individually or in combination.

This is exactly what the jewelry designer does with Design Elements. The
designer has to decode, that is, make sense of a series of elements and their attributes in light of our shared understandings about which Design Elements are appropriate, and how they should be legitimately expressed.

Let’s examine a set of jewelry Design Elements in more detail and elaboration.

DESIGN ELEMENT

Independent

GRAPHIC

REPRESENTATION

EXPRESSIVE VARIATIONS

Color

Schemes

Hue and Saturation

Simultaneity Effects

Values and Intensity

Temperature

Receding or Projecting

Shape

Recognizable

Focused

Distinct

Blended

Abstract

Filled or Empty

Delimited, fixed, geometric

Infinite, extending

Distorted or overlapped

Masculine or feminine

Organic or mechanical

Background, foreground, middle ground

Texture and
Pattern

Regular, Predictable, Statistical

Repeated or singular

Random, Non-Statistical

Feel or look

Layered or Non-layered

Smooth or Rough

Point, Line,
Plane

2-Dimensional

3-Dimensional

Conform or violate

Connected or Unconnected

Span and distance

Actual or implied

Thickness

Silhouette

Focused or unfocused

Bounded or unbounded

geometric or curved

Material

Natural or Man-Made

Soft or solid

Heavy or light

Single or mixed media

Light refraction, reflection, absorption

Technique and
Technology

Bead Weaving, Bead Stringing, Wire Working,
Fiber, Clay, etc.

With or without application of heat and/or
pressure

Fabricated or Machine Made

Pattern or freeform

DESIGN ELEMENT

Dependent

GRAPHIC
REPRESENTATION

EXPRESSIVE VARIATIONS

Dimensionality

2-dimensional
(volume and mass; weight; density)

3-dimensional (relief, low relief, high relief)

Interior and Exterior Contours

Frontal or in-the-round

Open or closed forms

Static or dynamic forms

Movement

Passive
(ex: use of color guides the eye)

Direction

Linear or wave

Physical
(ex: pieces, like fringe or spinners, actually move)

Stable or erratic

Mechanical
(ex: structure of piece allows piece to
drape and flow)

Color Blending

Simultaneity effects

Value and intensity

Saturation and vibrance

Distinct or blurred

Dominant or recessive

Theme, Symbols

Surface or interpreted meaning(s) or
inflected

Power, position, protection, identification

Clear or abstract referents

Object as whole, or parts of object

Repetition or not

Individual, group, cultural, societal,
universal

Beauty and
Appeal

Sensually pleasing: visual, touch, auditory,
taste, smell

Objective or emotional

Coherence, harmony and unity

Fashion, style, timeliness, timelessness

Structure and
Support

Stiff or flexible

Flow and drape

Linkage, connectivity

Wearability

Display

Organization

Articulation

Autonomy vs. Temporariness

Interactive with wearer, or not

Craftsmanship

Inspiration

Skill and dexterity

With tools, or not

Design acumen

Personality and preferences

Form, Segmentation,
Components

Shape with Volume

Whole or divided

Organized or chaotic

Perspective

2-dimensional or 3-dimensional

Alignment

Shading

Positioning or spacing

Simple or Complex

Balance and
Distribution

Symmetrical (By size, color, or shape)

Visual weight

Visual size

Asymmetrical (By size, color, or shape)

Radial
(By size, color or shape)

Visual placement

Random
(By size, color, or shape)

Stable or unstable

Directed or undirected

Referents to specific
idea or style

Vintage Revival

Direct or implied

Contemporary

Literal or figurative

Symbolic

Context,
Situation, Culture

Economic, social, psychological, cultural,
situational values

Complicit artist, or not

Derived meaning, or objective meaning

Negative and
Positive Space

Figure or ground

Form or no form

Shading

Perspective

Depth

Use of space around an object

Interpenetration of space

Illusion or reality

Placement

Light and
Shadow

Suggestive

Gradient

Perspective

Shading

Illumination

Solid or Cast

Dimensionality

Moon

The Japanese Fragrance Garden Bracelet

“Japanese Fragrance Garden Bracelet”, by Warren Feld, March 2018, photography by Warren Feld

For example, this is the kind of building blocks thinking I did when designing my Japanese Fragrance Garden Bracelet.

This bracelet has a foundation base. The finishes of these beads in the
base are either a luster finish or a dichroic finish. Off the base, I created flower stalks that were 4-6 seed beads tall, and topped with a slightly
larger and more brightly colored seed bead. The colors of the beads in the stalks vary from dark (near the base) to light (near the flower tip). Between
each bed of flowers is a “moon bridge” – the kind you might expect when
meandering through a Japanese garden.

See how I clustered independent and dependent Design Elements to achieve a particular expression.

What I Wanted To Achieve

Design Elements I Thought About

Movement
with flower stalks where they would retain their verticality
(thus not flop over) after the piece was worn.

Technique: Fringing technique
Technology: Use of One-G beading thread which, unlike
all other beading threads, has a springy quality to it. When the fringe is pulled out during
wearing, the thread helps spring it back into place

Color: To mimic how moving
colors will be perceived, I varied color in flower stalks from dark at the
bottom to medium to light at the top, just under the flower, and then used
bright colors for the flowers topping off each stalk
Point, Line: Easy for viewer to perceive and follow
movement of points and lines, which are key elements in the piece

Dimensionality
where the piece would not be seen as flat

Point, Line: Visually, the flower stalks lead the eye from the foundation
base, up the stalks, and to the bright flower colors on top of the
stalks.

Color: I use a reflective foundation base of two types of bead
finishes, (a) luster, and (b) dichroic.
Both have a mirroring effect, making it difficult for the eye to see
the “bottom”, and at the same time reflecting the colors sitting above them.

Color Blending
where as the eye moves up and down any flower stalk, or moves
across the piece from end to end, everything feels coherent and unified

Color: I make a wide use of simultaneity effects, where the placement
of one color affects the perception of the color next to it. This fools the brain into blending colors, which in reality, you cannot do easily with
beads (as opposed to paints).

Shape/Points/Line/Pattern: There is a consistent repetition of shapes, points and lines, and pattern, leading the viewer to be able to predict what should happen next along the bracelet, and again, fooling the brain into doing some color blending perceptual tricks of its own.

How Do You Teach Designers A Vocabulary of Design?

Most designers most likely start theirjewelry making careers taking craft-oriented classes and following instructions in how-to books or online in how-to videos. They learn to repeat a set of steps and end up with something like what is pictured. The whole jewelry making approach assumes that jewelry making is a natural process. Surround the budding artist with patterns, books and videos, and they will somehow become great jewelry designers.

Yet, although the artisans follow a set of steps over and over again, they never learn how to make choices or evaluate implications or get any experience making judgement calls and tradeoffs when designing something that must look good and wear well at the same time. Jewelry making is not a natural skill that is learned automatically. Jewelry designers need to be taught to design.

Towards this end, I think it is much more useful to build an educational curriculum and program around the idea of disciplinary literacy. We need to teach designers to explicitly and systematically think design. Designers need to be able to recognize the elements that make up a piece, how they were used, and how this leads to more or less success in evoking an expression or an emotional response.

Disciplinary Literacy, means, in part, that the designer is aware of the “codes” which were selected for a piece of jewelry. The designer is able to segment the piece and identify its Design Elements. The designer is also able to put Design Elements together and blend them to achieve a desired expression. The better designer is very aware of all the codes, or Design Elements. The better designer is very aware of how the codes, or Design Elements, were selected, combined, blended and expressed. And the designer is very aware of how and why clusters of Design Elements may sometimes get bounded; that is, may be unfortunately stuck within some
indeterminant meaning or expression.

Towards this end, this means first teaching designers how to decode. It means figuring out what universally accepted Design Elements should be used in a piece. It also means recognizing how these elements can vary, and how such variation can change the artistic or design expression
of the piece. Designers need to learn how Design Elements get clustered and constructed to convey certain expressions, and which cannot.

At this stage, we are training the designer to have some comfort recognizing and applying objective, shared understandings about what certain Design Elements mean, and the variations in how they might get expressed within a piece.

As the designer’s education progresses, we would gradually reduce the student’s involvement with decoding, and increase the involvement with tasks involving fluency. This involves more in-depth learning about
manipulation and construction. Here the designer is taught how to define a personal style and approach, and implement it. The designer is guided from creating the merely appealing, to the more resounding resonant. The designer is also taught to look for, anticipate and incorporate context clues. All this gets into the areas of grammar and process management, which I discuss in other articles.^[^1,2]

_________________________________________________________

WARREN FELD, Jewelry Designer
warren@warrenfeldjewelry.com
615-292-0610

His pieces have appeared in beading and jewelry magazines and books. One piece is in the Swarovski museum in Innsbruck, Austria.

He is probably best known for creating the international The Ugly Necklace Contest, where good jewelry designers attempt to overcome our pre-wired brains’ fear response for resisting anything Ugly.

Footnotes

^[1] Read my article Jewelry Design: A Managed Process, Klimt02.net Forum, https://klimt02.net/forum/articles/jewelry-design-managed-process-warren-feld

^[2] I discuss a little about shared understandings in a yet unpublished article I wrote about Contemporary Design. From that article…

“Shared understandings should be enduring, transferable, big ideas at the heart of what we think of as contemporary jewelry. These shared understandings are things which spark meaningful connections between designer and materials, designer and techniques, and designer and client. We need, however, to recognize that the idea of understanding is very multidimensional and complicated.

Understanding is not one achievement, but more the result of several loosely organized choices. Understanding is revealed through performance and evidence. Jewelry designers must perform effectively with knowledge, insight, wisdom and skill to convince us – the world at large and the client in particular — that they really understand what design, and with our case here, contemporary design, is all about. This involves a big interpersonal component where the artist introduces their jewelry to a wider audience and subjects it to psychological, social, cultural, and economic assessment.

Understanding is more than knowledge. The designer may be able to
articulate what needs to be done to achieve something labeled contemporary, but
may not know how to apply it.

Understanding is more than interpretation. The designer may be able to explain how a piece was constructed and conformed to ideas about contemporary, but this does not necessarily account for the significance of the results.

Understanding is more than applying principles of construction.    It is more
than simply organizing a set of Design Elements into an arrangement.     The designer must match knowledge and interpretation about contemporary to
the context.   Application is a context-dependent skill.

Understanding is more than perspective. The designer works within
a myriad of expectations and points of view about contemporary jewelry. The designer must dispassionately anticipate these various perspectives about contemporary design, and, bring some constructed point of view and knowledge of implications to bear within the design and design process.

We do not design in a vacuum. The designer must have the ability to
empathize with individuals and grasp their individual and group cultures. If selling their jewelry, the designer must have the ability to empathize with small and larger markets, as well. Empathy is not sympathy. Empathy is where we can feel what others feel, and see what others see.

Last, understanding is self-knowledge, as well. The designer should have the
self-knowledge, wisdom and insights to know how their own patterns of thought
may inform, as well as prejudice, their understandings of contemporary
design.

How the jewelry designer begins the process of creating a contemporary piece of jewelry is very revealing about the potential for success. The designer
should always begin the process by articulating the essential shared understandings against which their work will be evaluated and judged. For now, let’s refer to this as Backwards Design^[^4]. The designer starts with questions about assessment, and then allows this understanding to influence all other choices going forward.”

^[3] Backwards Design. I had taken two graduate education courses in Literacy and one in Planning that were very influential in
my approach to disciplinary literacy. One of the big take-aways from
Understanding by Design by Grant Wiggins and Jay McTighe,
2^nd Edition, Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development,
2005, was the idea they introduced of “backwards design”. Their point is that you can better teach understanding if you anticipate the evidence others will use in their assessments of what you are trying to do.
When coupled with ideas about teaching literacy and fluency (see
Literacy:Helping Students Construct Meaning by J. David Cooper, M. Robinson, J.A. Slansky and N. Kiger, 9^thEdition, Cengage Learning, 2015), you can begin to introduce ideas about managing the design process in a coherent and alignable way.

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Contemporary Jewelry Is Not A “Look” — It’s A Way Of “Thinking”

Posted by learntobead on February 15, 2018

CONTEMPORARY JEWELRY IS NOT A “LOOK” —
IT’S A WAY OF “THINKING”
by Warren Feld, Jewelry Artisan
warren@warrenfeldjewelry.com
718 Thompson Lane, Ste 123, Nashville, TN 37204
615-292-0610

“Canyon Sunrise”, Warren Feld, designer, 2004, Austrian crystal, glass seed beads, 14KT gold chain and constructed clasp, fireline cable thread, photographer Warren Feld

Abstract:
Contemporary Jewelry represents a specific approach for thinking through design. Making jewelry is, in essence, an authentic performance task. The jewelry artisan applies knowledge, skill and awareness within the anticipation of the influence and constraints of a set of shared understandings. Shared understandings relate to composition, construction and performance. These understandings are enduring, transferable, big ideas at the heart of what we think of as “contemporary jewelry”. They are things which spark meaningful connections between designer and materials, designer and techniques, and designer and client. Managing these connections is what we call “fluency in design”.

Jewelry Design is a professional discipline. Every legitimately defined profession has at its core a discipline-specific way of thinking. This includes core concepts, core rules, and core beliefs. And it includes professional routines and strategies for applying, manipulating and managing these. The good designer is fluent in how to think through design, and the good contemporary designer is fluent in how to think through design which earns the label “contemporary”.

But, the jewelry designer can only wonder at this with crossed eyes and bewilderment. As a profession, jewelry design balances a series of contradictions, most notably to what extent the practice is craft, art or design. This works against professional legitimacy.

Jewelry Design, as a discipline, is not always clear and consistent about its own literacy – that is, what it means to be fluent in design. Its core concepts, rules and beliefs are not well-defined, and often break down by medium, by operational location – (visualize museum, gallery, studio, store, factory, workshop, class, home), and by the degree of involvement and commitment to the profession of the jewelry designer him- or herself. The diversity of materials, approaches, styles and the like make it difficult to delineate any unifying principles or professional image.

As designers, we see, feel and experience the evolving dynamics of an occupation in search of a profession. But our profession is still in search of a coherent identify. Perhaps we see this most often in debates over how we come to recognize what jewelry we think should be labeled “contemporary” and what jewelry should not.

On the one hand, the idea of contemporary can be very elucidating. On the other, however, we are not sure what contemporary involves, how the label should be applied, and what the label represents. Yet, our sense-making search for its meaning is at the forefront of the professionalization of jewelry design. Our persistent questioning about “What is contemporary jewelry?” opens up thinking and possibilities for every jewelry designer, working across many styles and with many materials, both experienced and novice alike.

The term “contemporary” is defined as something occurring in our time, and that can be very confusing for the jewelry designer. We get caught in a major Identity Crisis for lack of a clear, agreed-upon definition of contemporary. How we resolve this Identity Crisis around a common understanding of “contemporary jewelry” can go a long way, I believe, towards developing a coherent disciplinary literacy and professional identity for all jewelry designers. Resolution can be very unifying.

Many conceptual questions about contemporary jewelry arise. We need to be very cognizant of how we think through our responses.

Does the label apply to every piece of jewelry made today? We see all kinds of styles, shapes, silhouettes, materials, techniques, fashions all around us. There appears to be no common denominator except that they all have been created in our time.

Should the label be applied to all this variation?

Could it?

Why would we want it to?

Does the label apply to a certain timeframe, with the expectation that it will be supplanted by another label sometime in the future?

What is contemporary jewelry?

“Contemporary” Is A Specific Approach For Thinking Through Design

I suggest that contemporary jewelry is not a specific thing. But rather it is a way of thinking through the design process. It is a type of thinking routine[1] which underlays the universal core of contemporary jewelry design.
Contemporary jewelry is not every piece of jewelry made in our time. It is, instead, jewelry designed and crafted with certain shared understandings in mind – understandings about composition, construction and performance.

Contemporary jewelry is not associated with any particular color or pattern or texture. It is, instead, a strategy for selecting colors, patterns and textures.

Contemporary jewelry is not something that only a few people would make or wear, whether boring or outlandish. It is, instead, something most people recognize as wearable with some level of appeal.

Contemporary jewelry is not restricted to the use of unusual or unexpected materials or techniques. It is, instead, something which leverages the strengths or minimizes the weaknesses of any and all materials and/or techniques used in a project.

Contemporary jewelry is not a specific silhouette, or line, or shape, or form, or theme, but, instead, something which shows the artist’s control over how these can be manipulated, used, played off of, and, even, violated.

Contemporary jewelry is an integral part of our culture. We wear jewelry to tell ourselves and to tell others we are OK. It is reflective of the sum of all our choices about how we think through our place among others, our relative value among others, our behaviors among others, our preferred ways to interact, challenge, conform, question, organize and arrange.

The contemporary jewelry designer is especially positioned to serve at the nexus of all this culture. The designer’s ability to think through and define what contemporary means becomes instrumental for everyone wearing their jewelry to successfully negotiate the day-to-day cultural demands of the community they live in. Designers have a unique ability to dignify and make people feel valued, respected, honored and seen.

Think of all that power!

Each person stands at that precipice of acceptance or not, relevance or not. The jewelry designer has the power to push someone in one direction, or another.
If only we had the established profession and a disciplinary literacy to help us be smart about this.

FLUENCY[2] IN DESIGN: Managing The Contemporary Design Process

Jewelry design is, in effect, an authentic performance task.

The jewelry designer demonstrates their knowledge, awareness and abilities to:

1. Work within our shared understandings about contemporary jewelry.

2. Apply key knowledge and skills to achieve the desired result – a contemporary piece of jewelry.

3. Anticipate how their work will be reviewed, judged and evaluated by criteria reflective of these same shared understandings.

4. Step back, reflect, and validate all their thinking to reject any misunderstandings, and make adjustments accordingly.

The better designer is able to bring a high level of coherence and consistency to the process of managing all this – shared understandings, knowledge and skills, evaluative review, and reflection and adjustment.
This is called “fluency in design”.

Shared Understandings[3]

Shared understandings should be enduring, transferable, big ideas at the heart of what we think of as contemporary jewelry. These shared understandings are things which spark meaningful connections between designer and materials, designer and techniques, and designer and client. We need, however, to recognize that the idea of understanding is very multidimensional and complicated.

Understanding is not one achievement, but more the result of several loosely organized choices. Understanding is revealed through performance and evidence. Jewelry designers must perform effectively with knowledge, insight, wisdom and skill to convince us – the world at large and the client in particular — that they really understand what design, and with our case here, contemporary design, is all about. This involves a big interpersonal component where the artist introduces their jewelry to a wider audience and subjects it to psychological, social, cultural, and economic assessment.
Understanding is more than knowledge. The designer may be able to articulate what needs to be done to achieve something labeled contemporary, but may not know how to apply it.

Understanding is more than interpretation. The designer may be able to explain how a piece was constructed and conformed to ideas about contemporary, but this does not necessarily account for the significance of the results.
Understanding is more than applying principles of construction. It is more than simply organizing a set of design elements into an arrangement. The designer must match knowledge and interpretation about contemporary to the context. Application is a context-dependent skill.

Understanding is more than perspective. The designer works within a myriad of expectations and points of view about contemporary jewelry. The designer must dispassionately anticipate these various perspectives about contemporary design, and, bring some constructed point of view and knowledge of implications to bear within the design and design process.

How the jewelry designer begins the process of creating a contemporary piece of jewelry is very revealing about the potential for success. The designer should always begin the process by articulating the essential shared understandings against which their work will be evaluated and judged. For now, let’s refer to this as Backwards Design[4]. The designer starts with questions about assessment, and then allows this understanding to influence all other choices going forward.

When designing contemporary jewelry, the designer will push for shared understandings about what it means to be worthy of the label “contemporary.” I propose the following five shared understandings as a place to start, and hopefully, to generate more discussion and debate.

These are,

1. Fixed Frameworks and Rules should not pre-determine what designers do.

Rules do exist, such as color schemes or rules for achieving balance or rhythm. But rules may be challenged or serve as guidelines for the designer. In fact, the designer may develop and implement rules of their own.

Designers do not learn understanding if they are only able to answer a question if framed in one particular way. How the designer invents and applies rules for managing design as a process become of primary importance because they reveal design fluency and thinking. And this allows for a variety of approaches as well as an escape from any dominant definitions. Nothing is sacred.

2. Jewelry should extend, rework, and play with, or even push, the boundaries of materials, techniques and technologies.

Contemporary designers are meant to ask questions, evaluate different options and experiment widely. They do this in order to leverage the strengths and minimize the weaknesses of materials, techniques and technologies used. Their jewelry should reflect this.

3. Jewelry should evoke emotions.

The audience is an integral part of the success of contemporary jewelry. The viewer/wearer recognizes things in the piece and is allowed to, (in fact, expected to), react and interpret. The designer’s goal is to achieve a level of resonance.

4. Jewelry should connect people with culture.

Contemporary jewelry is not made for art’s sake alone. Contemporary jewelry is made to connect to the world around us. It is meant to assist a person in recognizing how they want to live their lives, and how they want to introduce their view of themselves into the broader community or communities they live in.

5. Successful jewelry designs should only be judged as the jewelry is worn.

Jewelry is not designed in isolation from the human body. Its design should anticipate requirements for movement, drape and flow. Its design should anticipate the implications of the context in which the jewelry is worn. The implications for all jewelry design choices are most apparent at the boundary between jewelry and person.

Given that the designer “backward-designs [4],” he or she begins the process by anticipating those understandings about how their work will be assessed. The designer then is equipped to make three types of informed choices:

A. Choices about composition
B. Choices about construction
C. Choices about performance

The designer determines (a) what design elements to include in the piece, and then (b) rules for manipulating them. The contemporary designer (c) measures these against our shared understandings about contemporary design. These measures are a continuum – degrees of contemporary, not either/or’s or absolutes. In any given piece of jewelry, some design elements may be very contemporary, and others might not.

GOOD COMPOSITION:
Selecting and Articulating Upon Design Elements and Their Attributes

Jewelry making is a constructive process. It makes sense for the designer to begin with something like building blocks, which I call design elements. Design elements include things like color, movement, dimensionality, materials, use of space, and the like.

Each design element, in turn, encompasses a range of acceptable meanings, yet still reflective of that design element, and which are called attributes.
These design elements can be arranged in different configurations.

The combination of any two or more design elements can have synergistic effects.
Working with design elements is not much different than working with an alphabet. An alphabet is made up of different letters. Each letter has different attributes – how it is written, how it sounds, how it is used. Configurations of letters result in more sounds and more meanings and more ways to be used.

This is exactly what the jewelry designer does with design elements. The designer has to decode, that is, make sense of a series of elements and their attributes in light of our shared understandings about jewelry design. The contemporary designer decodes in light of our further shared understandings about contemporary jewelry design.

The designer might, for example, want to select from this list of design elements I have generated below. I have arranged these design elements into what is called a thinking routine[1]. The designer uses the routine to determine how each element might be incorporated into the piece, and how the desired attributes of each element relate to contemporary design. They might also use the routine to look for issues of true and false. They might use the routine to rate each element as to importance and uncertainty.

DESIGN ELEMENT	LESS CONTEMPORARY	MORE CONTEMPORARY
Dimensionality	Flat; Width/Length focus	Not Flat; Noticeable Width/Length/Height focus
Movement, Moving Elements	Little or no movement, either from the movement of actual components, or from how colors or patterns are used	Great sense of movement, either from the movement of components, or from how colors or patterns are used
Color, Color Blending	Follows color rules, resistant to violate them	Pushes color rules to the edge, or violates them
Light and Shadow	Little sense artist attempted to control light and shadow in a strategic sense	Great sense artist attempted to control light and shadow, strategically
Negative and Positive Spaces	Little sense artist attempted to control negative and positive spaces in a strategic sense	Great sense artist attempted to control negative and positive spaces strategically
Point, Line, Plane, Shape, Form	Conforms to expectations; comfortable working within basic parameters	Violates expectations; challenges basic parameters
Theme, Symbols	If used, themes and symbols are simplistic and readily identified	If used, themes and symbols have a complex relationship to form and structure, and stimulate debate and discussion to fully make sense of them
Beauty and Appeal	Primary goal of piece	Synergistic relationship between beauty and function to achieve designer’s ends
Structure and Support	Little concern with movement, drape and flow; unwilling to sacrifice appeal for function	Considerable concern with movement, drape and flow, and a willingness to make tradeoffs between appeal and function
Materials	Materials are selected for how they look	Materials are selected for how they function; designer leverages strengths and minimizes weaknesses
Craftsmanship	Disconnect from Artist as if Artist was anonymous	Shows Artist’s Hand
Context, Situation, Culture	Pieces created for the sake of making something, or for the sake of beauty and appeal only	Pieces created in anticipation of shared understandings about contemporary jewelry
Balance, Distribution	Conforms to expectations; comfortable working within basic parameters	Violates expectations; challenges basic parameters
Technique(s)	Selected without questioning implications of how technique affects boundary between jewelry and person	Selected after questioning implications of how technique affects boundary between jewelry and person
Texture, Pattern	Conforms to expectations; comfortable working within basic parameters	Violates expectations; challenges basic parameters
Reference and Reinforce an Idea, Style	May or may not reference and/or reinforce symbolic meanings; if so, usually does so in a linear fashion, such as mimicking or repeating them	May or may not reference and/or reinforce symbolic meanings; if so, learns from them, and then, based on this learning, takes the references to another level

Example of some choices I made using the routine when creating my piece Canyon Sunrise:
Canyon Sunrise, Warren Feld, 2004

What are some things which make this piece “Contemporary”?



Dimensionality	Two layers of beadwork. The top layer overlapping the bottom layer, where the first row of the bottom layer is attached to the 2nd row of the top layer, forcing a curvature along the top. The pendant sits on top of bottom layer and in line with top layer.
Moving Elements	The two layers are only connected at their tops. As the wearer moves, each layer can move somewhat independently of the other.
Color, Color Blending	The piece uses a 5-color scheme, but increases the natural proportions of one color relative to the others. There are many gaps of light between all the beads which calls for a color blending strategy(ies). The piece relies heavily on simultaneity effects, as well as the overlapping effects of transparent and translucent beads.
Technique(s)	The bead woven strips are allowed to fan out from the top, thus better accommodating the wearer’s body.

GOOD CONSTRUCTION:
Applying Knowledge, Skills, Competencies for Manipulating Design Elements

Design elements need to be selected, organized and implemented in some kind of satisfying design. Towards this end, the artist, consciously or not, anticipates our shared understandings in order to make these kinds of choices.

These are the most visible choices the artist makes. We can see the finished piece of jewelry. We interact with it. We question it. We get a sense of whether we want to emotionally respond to it. We either feel its resonance, or we don’t.

Most artists manage intuitively, learning to make good choices as they receive feedback and assessment, and adjust their decisions accordingly. The better jewelry designers, however, show “metacognitive awareness” of all the things they have thought of, anticipated, structured, and accomplished during the design process as these relate to larger shared understandings about contemporary jewelry.

Let’s return, for a minute, to the analogy with building blocks and the alphabet. The design elements are building blocks. I compared them to the letters of the alphabet. Building blocks have attributes, and letters have attributes. Attributes further define them and give them purpose.

The novice designer learns to decode these building blocks and their attributes. With more experience, the blocks, just like letters, get combined and constructed into words and phrases and larger, meaningful ideas and expressions.

In essence, the finished piece of jewelry is an exemplar of the jewelry artisan’s vocabulary and grammar of design. The fluency in how the artist uses this vocabulary and grammar in designing their piece should be, I would think, especially correlated with the success and resonance of the piece.

Often, artists implement their design element choices with attention and recognition to Principles of Construction. Principles of Construction are the rules or grammar for using design elements in a piece. Given the artist’s goals for beauty and function, the artist is free to apply the rules in any way she or he sees fit. However, we expect to find this grammar underlaying all pieces of jewelry, whether the piece is contemporary or otherwise.

When we want to apply the label “contemporary,” however, we search for the choices and logic the artist has used for constructing design elements into a contemporary whole, and in anticipation of our shared understandings.

I suggest these 10 Principles of Construction. All Principles need to be applied, yet each is different from and somewhat independent of the others. For example, the colors may be well chosen, but proportions or placement not right.

Principle of Construction	What the Principle is About
Rhythm	How the piece engages the viewer and directs their eye
Pointers	How the piece directs the viewer to a certain place or focal point
Planar Relationships	The degree the piece is not disorienting; obvious what is “up” and what is “down”
Interest	The degree the artist has made the ordinary…”noteworthy”
Statistical Distribution	How satisfying the numbers and sizes of objects within the piece are
Balance	How satisfying the placement of objects (and their attributes) is
Dimensionality	The degree to which the piece is flat or 3-dimensional, how satisfying this dimensionality is to the piece
Temporal Extension	How well the parts are integrated into the whole in anticipation of how, where and when the jewelry is to be worn; the whole should be more than the sum of its parts
Physical Extension/Finishing	The degree the piece is designed so that it accommodates physical stresses when the piece is worn
Parsimony	There should be no nonessential elements; the addition or subtraction of one element or its attribute will make the piece less satisfying

GOOD PERFORMANCE:
Seeking Continual Feedback and Evaluation About Choices and Results

The jewelry designer brings perspective. The designer shows they can rise above the passions, inclinations and dominant opinions of the moment to do what their feelings, thoughts and reflections reveal to be best. And, at the same time, the designer shows that they can strive for a rapport, a sharing of values, an empathetic response, a type of respect deemed contemporary.

If we return to our alphabet metaphor, it is necessary, but not sufficient, for the artist to assemble a palette of building blocks, thus, design elements. It is necessary, but not sufficient, for the artist to apply a vocabulary and grammar for arranging these building blocks, thus for constructing a piece of jewelry.

Most importantly, however, it is both necessary and sufficient for the artist to anticipate how the piece of jewelry will be assessed prior to making any choice about design element or construction. The more coherent and aligned each aspect of this process is, the better managed. To the extent the artist can strategically manage this whole “backwards” design process, the more fluent in design that artist is. The more fluent in design, the more the finished piece reveals the artist’s hand and resonates.

So, there is a very dynamic performance component to design. The contemporary jewelry designer needs to think about what criteria their client and the general culture and market will use as acceptable evidence of “contemporary” and “good contemporary design”, when the piece is introduced. The artist needs to think about things like connection, emotion, resonance, integrity, market.

The designer needs answers to several questions at this point.

What is the designer’s process and routine for thinking about shared understandings and evidence of authentic performance?

How well have they anticipated these criteria of evaluation?

Has the designer created a continual feedback loop so that acceptable evidence is introduced throughout the full process of design?

To what extent will the eventual evaluation of the contemporary jewelry designer and their work be fair, valid, reliable, and a sufficient measure of their results?

_________________________________________________________

WARREN FELD, Jewelry Designer
warren@warrenfeldjewelry.com
615-292-0610

His pieces have appeared in beading and jewelry magazines and books. One piece is in the Swarovski museum in Innsbruck, Austria.

He is probably best known for creating the international The Ugly Necklace Contest, where good jewelry designers attempt to overcome our pre-wired brains’ fear response for resisting anything Ugly.

_________________________________________________________

FOOTNOTES

1 Thinking Routines. I teach jewelry design. I find it useful to engage students with various ways of thinking out loud. They need to hear me think out loud about what choices I am making and what things I am considering when making those choices. They need to hear themselves think out loud so that they can develop strategies for getting more organized and strategic in dealing with information and making decisions. My inspiration here was based on the work done by Visible Thinking by Project Zero at Harvard Graduate School of Education .

2 Fluency. I took two graduate education courses in Literacy. The primary text we used was Literacy: Helping Students Construct Meaning by J. David Cooper, M. Robinson, J.A. Slansky and N. Kiger, 9th Edition, Cengage Learning, 2015. Even though the text was not about jewelry designing per se, it provides an excellent framework for understanding what fluency is all about, and how fluency with language develops over a period of years. I have relied on many of the ideas in the text to develop my own ideas about a disciplinary literacy for jewelry design.

3 Shared Understandings. In another graduate education class, the major text reviewed the differences between understanding and knowledge. The question was how to teach understanding. Worth the read to gain many insights about how to structure teaching to get sufficient understanding to enrich learning. Understanding by Design by Grant Wiggins and Jay McTighe, 2nd Edition, Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development, 2005.

4 Backwards Design. One of the big take-aways from Understanding by Design (see footnote 2) was the idea they introduced of “backwards design”. Their point is that you can better teach understanding if you anticipate the evidence others will use in their assessments of what you are trying to do. When coupled with ideas about teaching literacy and fluency (see footnote 1), you can begin to introduce ideas about managing the design process in a coherent and alignable way.

Posted in design management, jewelry design, jewelry making, Learn To Bead, Stitch 'n Bitch | Tagged: art, beading, craft, design, jewelry, jewelry design, jewelry making | 3 Comments »

JEWELRY DESIGN: A Managed Process

Posted by learntobead on January 4, 2018

“Jewelry is art, but only art as it is worn.”

That’s a powerful idea, — “as it is worn” — but, when making jewelry, we somewhat ignore it. We bury it somewhere in the back of our brains, so it doesn’t get in the way of what we are trying to do. We relegate it to a phrase on the last page of a book we have promised ourselves to read sometime, so it doesn’t put any road blocks in front of our process of creation.

We like to follow steps, and are thrilled when a lot of the thinking has been done for us. We like to make beautiful things. But, we do not want to have to make a lot of choices. We don’t want anything to disrupt our creative process.

We do not want to worry about and think about and agonize over jewelry “as it is to be worn.” Let’s not deal with those movement, architectural, engineering, context, interpersonal and behavioral stuff. We just want to make things.

To most artisans, making jewelry should never be work. It should always be fun.

Making jewelry should be putting a lot of things on a table in front of you, and going for it.

Making jewelry just is. It is not something we have to worry about managing.

It is easy to make, copy or mimic jewelry someone else has designed, either through kits or through imitation.

Making jewelry is doing. Not thinking.

Creating. Not managing.

We prefer to make jewelry distinct from any context in which it might be worn or sold. We don’t want someone looking over our shoulder, while we create. We don’t want to adjust any design choice we make because the client won’t like it, or, perhaps, it is out of fashion or color-shaded with colors not everyone likes. Perhaps our design choices at-the-moment do not fit with the necessities associated with how we need to market our wares to sell them. Our pieces might somehow be off-brand.

All too often, we avoid having to think about the difficult choices and tradeoffs we need to make, when searching for balance. That is balance among aesthetics, functionality, context, materials and technique. And balance between our needs as designers and the wearer’s needs, as well. So, too, we shy aware from making any extra effort to please “others” or “them”. Even though this hardly makes sense if we want these “others” or “them” to wear our jewelry or buy our jewelry creations.

Everything comes down to a series of difficult choices. We are resistant to making many of them. So we ignore them. We pretend they are choices better left to other people, though never fully sure who those other people are. We yearn to be artists, but resign ourselves to be craftspersons. We dabble with art, but avoid design.

We hate to make trade-offs between art and function; that is, allow something to be a little less beautiful so that it won’t break or not drape and move well when worn. We hate to make things in colors or silhouettes we don’t like. We hate to make the same design over and over again, even though it might be popular or sell well.

But make these kinds of choices we must! Your jewelry is a reflection of the sum of these choices. It is a reflection of you. You as an artist. You as a crafter. You as architect and engineer. You as social scientist. You as a business person. You as a designer.

So, the more we can anticipate what kinds of choices we need to make, and the more experience we have to successfully manage and maneuver within these choices, the more enjoyable and successful our jewelry designs become … and the more satisfying for the people for whom we make them.

JEWELRY DESIGN IS A MANAGEMENT PROCESS

Designers who are able to re-interpret the steps she or he go through and see them in “process” terms, that is, with organization and purpose, have the advantage.

There are many different kinds of choices to be made, but they are interdependent and connected. Recognizing interdependency and connectedness makes it easier to learn about, visualize and execute these choices as part of an organized, deliberate and managed jewelry design process.

I am going to get on my soap box here. We tend to teach students to very mechanically follow a series of steps. We need, instead, to teach them “Process”. Strategy. Insight. Connectedness. Contingency. Dependency. Construction. Context. Problem-Solving. Consequences.

Good jewelry design must answer questions and teach practitioners about managing the processes of anticipating the audience, selecting materials, implementing techniques, and constructing the piece from one end to the other. Again, this is not a mechanical process. Often, it is not a linear step-by-step pathway. There is a lot of iteration – that is, the next choice made will limit some things and make more relevant other things which are to happen next.

A “process” is something to be managed, from beginning to end, as the designer’s knowledge, techniques and skills are put to the test. That test could be very small-scale and simple, such as creating a piece of jewelry to give to someone as a gift. Or creating a visual for a customer. Or when you need to know the costs. Or, that test could be very large-scale and more complex, such as convincing a sales agent to represent your jewelry in their showroom.

Better Jewelry Designers smartly manage their design processes at the boundary between jewelry and person. It is at this boundary where all the interdependencies of all the various types of choices we designers make are clearest and have the most consequence.

WELL-DESIGNED JEWELRY MUST BE MANAGED
AT THE BOUNDARY BETWEEN JEWELRY AND PERSON

What exactly does it mean to “manage design at the boundary between jewelry and person?” What kinds of things happen at that boundary?

A person breathes. She moves. She sits at a desk, perhaps fidgeting with her jewelry. She might make sudden turns. She gracefully transitions from one space to another. She has shape, actually many shapes.

Her jewelry serves many purposes. It signifies her as someone or something. It expresses her feelings. Or status. Or future intentions. Or past history. It ties her to people and places, events and times. It suggests power, or lack thereof. It hides faults, and amplifies strengths. It implies whether she fits with the situation.

Jewelry attracts. It attracts seekers of the wearer’s attention. It wards off denigrators. It orients people to the world around them. It tells them a story with enough symbol, clue and information to allow people to decide whether to flee or approach, run away or walk toward, hide or shine.

Jewelry has a feel and sparkle to it. It reminds us that we are real. It empowers a sensuality and a sexuality. It elevates our esteem. Sometimes uncomfortable or scratchy. Sometimes not. Sometimes reflective of our moods. Othertimes not.

Jewelry is a shared experience. It helps similar people find one another. It signals what level of respect will be demanded. It entices. It repels. It offers themes both desirable and otherwise.

Jewelry has shape, form and mechanics. All the components must self-adjust to forces of movement, yet at the same time, not lose shape or form or maneuverability. If a piece is designed to visually display in a particular way, forces cannot be allowed to disrupt its presentation. Jewelry should take the shape of the body and move with the body. It should not make a mockery of the body, or resist the body as it wants to express itself.

Jewelry defines a silhouette. It draws a line on the body, often demarcating what to look at and what to look away from. What to touch, and what to avoid. What is important, and what is less so.

Managing here at the boundary between jewelry and person means understanding what wearing jewelry involves and is all about. There is an especially high level of clarity at this boundary because it is here where the implications of any choice matters.

The choice of stringing material anticipates durability, movement, drape. The choices of color and shape and silhouette anticipate aesthetics, tensions between light and shadow, context, the viewer’s needs or personality or preferences at the moment. The choice of technique anticipates how best to coordinate choices about materials with purpose and objective. The choice of price determines marketability, and where it’s out there, and whether it’s out there.

You choose Fireline cable thread and this choice means your piece will be stiffer, might hold a shape better, might resist the abrasion of beads, but also might mean less comfort or adaptability.

You choose cable wire and this choice means that your piece might not lay right or comfortably. A necklace will be more likely to turn around on the neck. It might make the wearer look clownish. At the same time, it might make the stringing process go more quickly. Efficiency translates into less money charged, and perhaps more sales.

You choose to mix opaque glass with gemstone beads, mixing media which do not necessarily interact with the eye and brain in the same way. This may make interacting with the piece seem more like work or annoying.

The ends of your wirework will not keep from bending or unraveling, so you solder them. Visually this disrupts the dance you achieve with wire bending and cheapens it.

You choose gray-toned beads to intersperse among your brightly colored ones. The grays pick up the colors around them, adding vibrancy and resonance to your piece. The gaps of light between each bead more easily fade away as the brain is tricked into filling them in with color.

You mix metalized plastic beads in with your Austrian crystal beads. In a fortnight, the finish has chipped off all the plastic beads.

You construct a loom bracelet, flat, lacking depth or a sense of movement. Your piece may be seen as pretty, but out of step with contemporary ideas of fashion, style, and design.

If we pretend our management choices here do not matter, we fool ourselves into thinking we are greater artists and designers than we really are.

JEWELRY DESIGN MANAGEMENT:
BUILDING A STRUCTURE AND ORGANIZATION FOR THINKING THROUGH DESIGN

Design management is multi-faceted. We intuitively know that proper preparation prevents piss poor performance. So let’s properly prepare. This means…

PROJECT
Defining what I do as a “Project To Be Managed” — My Project is seen as a “system”, not merely a set of steps. The “system” encompasses everything it takes that enables creativity and leads it to success. These include things related to art, architecture, engineering, management, behavioral and context analysis, problem-solving, and innovation. For some designers, these also include things related to business, marketing, branding, selling and cost-accounting.
INSPIRATION
Documenting, through image, writing or both, the kinds of things that are inspiring me and influencing my design

PURPOSE
Elaborating on the purpose or mission of my Project – why am I doing this Project as it applies to me, and as it applies to others?
SITUATION
Measuring the context and situation as these will/might/could impact my Project

STRATEGY
Developing a strategy for designing my piece — outlining everything that needs to come together to successfully work through my Project from beginning to end
SKILLS
Verifying, Learning or Re-Learning the necessary techniques and skills
SUPPLIES
Securing my supply chain to get all our materials, tools and supplies needed when I need them
CONSTRUCTION
Applying design principles of composition, form and structure. Paying careful attention to building in architectural pre-requisites, particularly those involved with support, jointedness and movement.
SHOWCASE
Introducing my Jewelry Design to a wider audience. This might involve sharing, show-casing, or marketing and selling
REPLICATION
Anticipating all that it will take to replicate the piece, if it is not a one-off, especially if I am developing kits or selling my pieces
REFLECTION
Evaluating whether I could repeat this or a similar Project with any greater efficiency or effectiveness – The better jewelry artist is one who is more reflective.

DESIGN THINKING

Designing jewelry demands that we both do and think. Create and manage. Experience and reflect.

The better Jewelry Designer sees any Project as a system of things, activities and outcomes. These are interconnected and mutually dependent. Things are sometimes linear, but most often iterative – a lot of back and forth and readjustments.

The better Jewelry Designer is very reflective. She or he thinks about every detail, plays mental exercises of what-if analyses, monitors and evaluates all throughout the Project’s management. She or he thinks through the implications of each choice made. The Designer does not blindly follow a set of instructions without questioning them.

At the end of the day, your jewelry is the result of the decisions you made.

Something to think about.

HOW DO WE TEACH JEWELRY DESIGN THINKING
AS A MANAGEMENT PROCESS

We should teach students to design jewelry, not craft it. Rather than have students merely follow a set of steps, we need to do what is called “Guided Thinking”.

For example, we might encourage students to construct and feel and touch similar pieces made with different materials, beads and techniques, and have them tell us what differences they perceive. We should guide them in thinking through the implications for these differences. When teaching a stitch, I typically have students make samples using two different beads – say a cylinder bead and a seed bead, and try two different stringing materials, say Fireline and Nymo threads.

We also should guide them in thinking through all the management and control issues they were experiencing. Very often beginning students have difficulty finding a comfortable way to hold their pieces while working them. I let them work a little on a project, stop them, and then ask them to explain what was difficult and what was not. I suggest some alternative solutions – but do not impose a one-best-way – and have them try these solutions. Then we discuss them, fine-tuning our thinking.

I link our developing discussions to some goals. We want good thread management for a bead woven piece. We want the beads to lay correctly within the piece. We want the piece to feel fluid. We return to Guided Thinking. I summarize all the choices we have made in order to begin the project: type of bead, size of bead, shape of bead, type of thread, strategy for holding the piece while working it, strategy for bringing the new bead to the work in progress. I ask the students what ideas are emerging in their minds about how to bring all they have done so far together.

At this point, I usually would interject a Mini-Lesson, where I demonstrate, given the discussions, the smarter way to begin the Project. In the Mini-Lesson, I “Think Aloud” so that my students can see and hear how I am approaching our Project.

And then I continue with Guided Thinking as we work through various sections of the Project towards completion. Whatever we do – select materials, select and apply techniques, set goals, anticipate how we want the Project to end up – is shown as resulting from a managed process of thinking through our design.

In “Guided Thinking”, I would prompt my students to try to explain what is/is not going on, what is/is not working as desired, where the student hopes to end up, what seems to be enhancing/impeding getting there.

With guidance, demonstration and repetition, it is my hope that such thinking becomes a series of Thinking Routines my students resort to when starting a new project. As students develop and internalize more Thinking Routines, they develop greater Fluency with design.

And that should be our primary goal as teachers: developing our students’ Fluency with design.

Posted in Art or Craft?, bead weaving, beads, beadwork, business of craft, design management, jewelry design, jewelry making, Learn To Bead | Tagged: beading, design management, jewelry design, jewelry design theory | 1 Comment »

Knowing What To Know

Posted by learntobead on April 12, 2014

ORIENTATION
“Knowing what to know”
http://www.landofodds.com/store/kitsorientation.htm

There were always beaders. There were always jewelry makers. But if you wanted to gain an understanding of the beads and jewelry findings and stringing materials and tools, their qualities, and what happens to them when they age, you would need to start with a little bit of the history of beads and jewelry making. And then progress into some more in-depth information about these materials, how you choose which ones to use, and what happens to all this stuff over time.

Only in this way, would you be able to prepare yourself for the judgments and trade-offs and choices you will need to make as a jewelry designer. Choices about How? And When? And What? to use and not to use, given your particular project, your design goals, …(and if you’re selling your pieces, your marketing goals, as well). Moreover, how do you know how to assemble and link everything up into a finished piece?

But often in this world, you don’t know where to start. You don’t necessarily know where to find answers, or whose answers to trust.

QUESTION FOR GROUP:
When you began to make jewelry and bead, how did you know what to know?
How did you initially get an Orientation?

More on Orientation….

I’ve posted an extensive series (18 videos, 5 ½ hours worth of materials) of Orientation information on the Land of Odds website for you to take advantage of.
http://www.landofodds.com/store/kitsorientation.htm

These are also posted on YouTube.

Continuing from an article I wrote….

You need to prepare yourself for the multi-faceted world of beading and jewelry. It’s all about choices. You need an Orientation to what you need to know, and to the kinds of choices you will need to make. The world of beads can often be a jungle, dense with colors, shapes, and styles, intermingled irrationally, spilled relentlessly, collapsing around you with dumps and crashes and screeches and rings. Your eyes become useless in this heart of darkness. The presence of so many beads and so many strangely shaped and curiously articulated metal pieces may make the idea of creating jewelry and beadwork utterly meaningless. At least for the moment.

But you can sense something more. It’s tactile. It’s visual. It has some kind of taste and smell which steers you. It’s orienting. It seems full of significance. And in this dark silence – so noisy with details, so hushed with confusion – you realize why it’s important that you need to know a lot of things.

– You need to know how to step around quality differences among glass beads made in the Czech Republic, in Japan, in China and in India. How long will these beads last? Will they break? If they chip, what color will they be on the inside? Is the patterning in the glass a coating, a decal or some artistic placement of shards and stringers of glass? How sharp are the holes? How consistent are the beads from bead to bead on the strand?

– You need to know when to demand 14KT gold fused to brass (gold-filled), or 14KT gold plate over silver (vermeil), or Hamilton Gold Plate over brass. How long does the shine and color last? Do these beads and pieces break or crumble or bend or dent?

– You need to know how what came before you will be an important influence on you today. How have the Oglala Sioux, the Pope, Zulu tribes, the French, Italian, Czech, Dutch, African, the shoe and upholstery industries, and North American Indians affected beads and jewelry today?

Most people don’t orient themselves when they get started. They either don’t see the need, or don’t think they have the time, or think there’s not that much to learn about. Anyone can put some beads on a string and make themselves a bracelet, they assume. They take any class that they can find, often taking more advanced classes, before having taken beginner classes. All they want to do is make a pretty piece to wear. The learning to design is secondary – or non-existent. They buy any book, try to reproduce any pattern, try to copy any picture they see in a magazine, and try to figure things out by themselves without any outside feedback, evaluation and validation. They overly-rely on the advice of the first people they talk with, and don’t question it.

What happens is often very sad, indeed. You end up using inappropriate stringing materials and supplies. You end up finishing off your pieces incorrectly. You never learn how to best attach a clasp. You never learn how to control the tension of beads within your pieces. You mix pieces which are dysfunctional when used together. You end up taking the wrong classes, not questioning the advice of friends or instructors, and buying the wrong parts, given what you are trying to do. You end up making ill-informed choices.

You need an Orientation, and you need to be sure you get one.

In an Orientation, you’ll discover the order of things. There’s an arrangement to beading and jewelry design. Pieces have purposes and functions. They have a history of use and wear. They have an underlying vocabulary and grammar of construction – that is, they have rules for how things should get combined and assembled, and how they should not.

An Orientation grounds you. It shows you the map, the pathways, the bi-ways, the highways along which you can travel in your development as a fine craftsperson, artist and jewelry designer. It gives you a sense of your surroundings, your context, and a lot of substance and meaning.

At first, when you get oriented, you marvel at the details and the possibilities – the myriad types of beads and findings and stringing materials, the wide variations in how they work and function, the multitude of choices which seem overwhelming. Pinks become fuchsias become reds become oxbloods become garnets. Peridots become mints become olivines, both green and brown, become green lusters become jades become dark kellys and smaragds. Metalized Plastics become nickels become brasses become pewters become sterlings and argentiums and fine silvers and platinums. Threads become bead cords become cable threads become cable wires become hard wires. Jewelry is clasped or clasp-less, strung or woven, wire-worked or wire-wrapped, singular or multiplexed, fixed or adjustable, singular- or multi-media.

But then, something else strikes you. You come to know that, while there’s always been a fundamental sense of design across time and cultures, this sense has often been understated. You find indifference, not indignation. You find an absence, a void, a vacuum of intellectual introspection about jewelry and its design. It’s all around you. That something missing. You feel the lacking. And when you begin to have this sense, you should feel a little superior, in that you are now on your way towards understanding design. You’ve got the hunger. You’ve got the passion. You want to know the place of design in jewelry, and your place in the design world with that jewelry you create. That jewelry you construct. That jewelry that you put forth into the world. That jewelry which reflects who you are as an artist, to your inner most thoughts.

Orienting Myself

I never had an orientation. I was never oriented. I sank or swam.

There was no real internet, when I started. Nor any beading magazines. Never met people in Nashville who made jewelry. Except for my partner, James, who made beautiful things with whatever parts and beads and stones he could find. But he couldn’t articulate exactly what he was doing. He was “Creating”.

The act of “creating,” did not result in unbreakable pieces, or a mix of pieces which endured the ravages of wear equally, or clasp assemblies which never came undone. The act of “Creating” gave few clues about hole sizes and hole sharpness and stringing material flexibility, and what led to good drape. The act of “Creating” merely resulted in beautiful things – wearable, drape-able, moveable, durable, or not.

During the first two years I made jewelry, things broke. The finishes of beads rubbed off. The beads did not necessarily lay right. Many pieces were too stiff – lacked good ease. The pieces kept selling, so what did I care?

But at some point, I did begin to care. I was irritated by the number of repairs I had to do on my own pieces.

At one point, I began taking in repairs of other jewelry artists’ work. This was my education. I saw where things broke. I saw the choices other people made in determining how to construct their pieces from end to end. I could talk to the customers and find out a lot of the things leading up to their jewelry breaking.

I began to ask more questions of my suppliers. I began to ask more questions about myself and my choices. I began formulating hypotheses about why some things worked or endured better than others. And I had many opportunities, now that I was doing a lot of repairs, to test out these hypotheses.
But it would have been much better had I had a more formalized, organized, intelligent orientation when I first got started.

Posted in bead weaving, beadwork, jewelry making, Learn To Bead, Resources | Tagged: orientation to beads and jewelry findings | Leave a Comment »

New Column Posted to “How To Bead A Rogue Elephant”

Posted by learntobead on September 2, 2011

New Column Posted
“How To Bead A Rogue Elephant”

Getting Started in Beading and Jewelry Making
Excerpts from this book on the following topics…
Click here

– Catching the “Bead-Bug”
– What Can You Do With Beads
– Getting Started
– Finding Inspirations
– Shopping for Beads
– What To Look For In A Bead
– How Not To Shop
– Be A Good Customer
– Buyer Beware
– Tips for Buying Beads At A Bead Show
– What Should I Create?
– Planning Your Necklace
– Anatomy of a Necklace
– Measurements You Need to Know
– Working from a Palette
– How Do You Learn?
– The Types of Things You Need to Learn
– On My Own, Through Books, or Through Classes?
– Reading Patterns and Instructions
– Self-Esteem — Making Choices
– Selling vs. Keeping
– Beading Aphorisms

Posted in bead weaving, beads, beadwork, jewelry design, Learn To Bead | 2 Comments »

Beading For Children Focuses The Mind

Posted by learntobead on January 3, 2011

Beading for Children Focuses The Mind

Cherly McMahan of the Icenhower Intermediate School, Mansifield ISD, in Arlington, Texas, shared this article she recently wrote. The article was about Instructions for children’s beading projects for use in project based learning and therapy for children with autism.

http://knol.google.com/k/cheryl-mcmahan/just-bead-it/1bvwxgiggyj0d/25#view

I thought you would enjoy reading it.

Posted in bead weaving, Learn To Bead | Tagged: autism, bead projects for children, beading with children | Leave a Comment »

The “Educated” Beader

Posted by learntobead on July 17, 2009

The EDUCATED Beader
What Do We Mean By This?

What does it mean to be an “Educated” beader? Exactly what would it have been that you would have learned or learned to do, to earn the label “educated”?

What would be expected of this “Educated” beader?

What kinds of choices would be expect this “Educated” beader to be able to make?

If we do a Google search online for our educated beader, what would we find?

Educate you about the essential tools and techniques
– Bead Unique Magazine

promote socially responsible retailing
– South African cooperative MonkeyBiz

educate more people about the art of beading
– Wikipedia

We educate our customers from the very first purchase and continue to do so as needs and level of experience progress.
– Calebs Lighthouse

inform and educate beaders of the beauty and versatility of beads
– beadingtimes.com

Educate yourself about bead finishes and types
– the Illustrated Bead Bible

We get a lot of generalities and platitudes, but we don’t get a more specific, detailed, enlightened idea of who we want to called an “educated beader” and who we do not.

Is it someone who beads a lot? Learned specific skills? Can do specific things? Has knowledge of certain terms?

Is the beader who has taken 15 beading classes more educated than the beader who has only taken 3?

Is the beader who can do peyote more educated than the beader who can do right angle weave?

Is the person who knows the differences between lobster claws, toggle clasps, slide clasps and doorknocker clasps more educated than the person who cannot?

We need answers to questions like these, if we are to be able to define what we should teach and how we should teach it.

What do you think? Please add your comments to the discussion.

Posted in Learn To Bead | Tagged: bead classes, bead education, bead schools, beadwork, how-to, jewelry making, learn, learning crafts, training | Leave a Comment »

What’s Happening at CBJA

Posted by learntobead on February 28, 2009

logo1sm THE CENTER FOR
BEADWORK & JEWELRY ARTS
If you want to add your email address to receive our Spring and Fall Designer Gazettes, email us at
oddsian@landofodds.com
type DESIGNER GAZETTE in the subject line

BEAD STUDY

TOPIC: Dimensional Shapes in Beadwork

We will be using Diane Fitzgerald's new book on dimensional shapes as a study guide. The book is entitled "Shaped Beadwork: Dimensional Jewelry with Peyote Stitch". We have copies for sale in the shop.

We will probably stick with this topic for the next 12 months.

We will organize the studies into 5 units:

(1) Making basic polygons

(2) Making donut polygons

(3) 3-Dimensional Shapes

(4) "Shape" as a design element

"Dimensionality" as a design element

(5) Other Geometrics from other artists, like Julia Pretl, Jean Powers, Judith Walker, Laura McCabe

dfdimensional

BEAD WEAVING WORKSHOPSLaura McCabe –May 1-3, 2009

(1 places remaining)

Friday, 5/1/2009

Geo-Floral Beaded Bead (Registration fee, $125.00) Kits available for purchase from instructor – cost $45.00. LOOK N’ SEE:
www.landofodds.com/beadschool/images/laura-mccabe-geo-floral-beaded-bead.jpg

(4 places remaining)

Saturday/Sunday, 5/2-3/2009 Dahlia Garland Necklace (Registration fee, $250.00)

Kits available for purchase from instructor – cost $110.00. LOOK N’ SEE:

www.landofodds.com/beadschool/images/laura-mccabe-dahlia-garland-necklace.jpg

Cynthia Rutledge – October 9-11, 2009

(12 places remaining)

Friday, 10/9/2009

A Chain Reaction (Registration fee, $125.00; optional kit, $70.00 (4 palettes available)

LOOK N' SEE:

http://www.cynthiarutledge.net/workshops/b-chain-reaction.htm

(10 places remaining)

Saturday and Sunday, 10/10-11/2009

Intermezzo Necklace (Registration fee, $250.00, optional kit, price to be announced (2 palettes to be available)

LOOK N' SEE:

http://www.cynthiarutledge.net/workshops/n-intermezzo.htm

Dallas Lovett – April 16-18, 2010Workshop topics to be announced

Marcia DeCoster – September 10-12^th, 2010Workshop topics to be announced

Sherry Serafini – August 26-28, 2011

Workshop Topics to be announced

SILVERSMITHING WORKSHOPS BY DON NORRIS

There is a limit to 10 registrants per workshop. His workshops fill quickly.

(8 slots available)

Monday, April 6^th, 9am-6pm, (1-day) Beginner Silversmithing Workshop $200.00 fee includes instruction, all materials and tools

Emphasis on learning how to solder with a hand held torch, and creating a setting for a stone

PMC and WIREWORK EARRINGS WORKSHOPEARRINGS, EARRINGS, EARRINGS
Sat, 6/27, 10am-4pm

Instructor: Elesa Phares
$130.00 fee plus $35.00 materials charge

($165.00 deposit reserves space)

(8 slots available)

This is an all day class. The student will learn a few PMC (precious metal clay) techniques, make a pair of PMC (precious metal clay), earrings and while firing, will learn 2-3 other wire-wrapped earring designs.

COME STUDY JEWELRY DESIGN WITH US IN TUSCANY, ITALY“Contemporizing Traditional Etruscan Jewelry” TBA, 2010

Toscana Americana has invited us to lead an 8-day workshop in Cortona, Italy in Tuscany and near Florence. The workshop – Contemporizing Traditional Etruscan Jewelry – teaches some bead stringing and bead weaving techniques, introduces you to some in-depth jewelry design concepts and theories, and guides you in the creation of 2 or 3 contemporized pieces of jewelry. More information on-line: www.landofodds.com/store/toscananarrativesynopsis.htm

Posted in bead weaving, beads, beadwork, jewelry design, jewelry making, Learn To Bead, Travel Opportunities, Workshops, Classes, Exhibits | Tagged: bead weaving, beadwork, dimensional beadwork, jewelry design, learn study, shapes in beadwork, workshops | Leave a Comment »

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JEWELRY DESIGN PRINCIPLES: COMPOSING, CONSTRUCTING, MANIPULATING by Warren Feld, Designer

JEWELRY DESIGN PRINCIPLES: COMPOSING, CONSTRUCTING, MANIPULATING

New Column Posted “How To Bead A Rogue Elephant”

Getting Started in Beading and Jewelry Making Excerpts from this book on the following topics… Click here

JEWELRY DESIGN PRINCIPLES:

COMPOSING, CONSTRUCTING, MANIPULATING

by Warren Feld, Designer

JEWELRY DESIGN PRINCIPLES:

COMPOSING, CONSTRUCTING, MANIPULATING

New Column Posted
“How To Bead A Rogue Elephant”

Getting Started in Beading and Jewelry Making
Excerpts from this book on the following topics…
Click here