Wednesday, December 7, 2011

Implement Detachment










Wednesday, November 9, 2011

OBJECTive ART AWARDS 2011

29 October -2 December 2011
Mangere Arts Centre – Ngā Tohu o Uenuku
Corner Orly Avenue & Bader Drive, Auckland

In conversation
Talk by Deborah Crowe, Mary-Louise Browne and James Pinker
Saturday 19th November 2pm

“Kia tapu, Kia hua, Kia puawai.
To grow, to prosper, to sustain”

This quote from Princess Te Puea Herangi was the theme for this year’s entry.


#5863, 2011, neckware

By constructing a piece of Neckware that is driven by wanting to bewilder where it sits in time and space, I dissect my materials and shift them from their everyday, banal existence as domestic implements into a contemporary jewellery context. #5863 has grown and prospered into a single object that is decorative while still suggesting a mechanistic function and fit. The compositional process is also sustained through the objects ability to be reconfigured by the wearer.

This is a continued area of investigation for me this year and #5863 is presented beautifully in a glass case on its own, adding to its strong sense of presence. Objective is well worth the visit this year; the organisers have put together a strong exhibit of highly refined art works, of which I have to say there is a very strong presence of jewellers.

My congratulation goes out warmly to Raewyn Walsh for her winning piece Vessel 2011. This I felt was a well deserved win that was very fitting to Raewyn’s practice. As a contemporary jeweller, Raewyn’s strengths stretch out in her experimentation with vessels especially the teapot.

I would also like to congradulate Kvetoslava Sekanova (2nd) for White Book and Jasmine Watson (3rd) for Subsequence who are both currently exhibiting along side me in the Fingers group show

Monday, November 7, 2011

Fingers Group Show 2011

Fingers Annual Group Show October 31st - November 11th 2011
2 KITCHENER ST / CNR KHARTOUM PLACE
AUCKLAND CENTRAL
OPENING HOURS
MON - FRI 10AM - 5.30PM
SAT & SUN 11AM - 4.30PM


Current (orange) 2011, Neckpiece



Current (orange) 2011, back detail



Pinch Me 2011, Neckware



Rocket 2011, Button hole Brooch





Winner of the New Zealand Jewellery Show 2011

See winning images;
http://www.jewelleryshow.co.nz/media-1

Media Release: 09 September 2011

Diamonds and Twine
Opposites attract judges eyes at the New Zealand Jewellery Show Design Awards.
You wouldn’t find two more polar opposite pieces: a fine jewellery flower ring that transforms at the flick of a hidden mechanism into a pendant studded with almost $30,000 worth of sapphires and diamonds, and a contemporary pendant made using wooden kitchen utensils, firewood, garden twine and nuts and bolts, but both of them were winners at the New Zealand Jewellery Show Design Awards last night.
WINNER – contemporary: Sarah Walker-Holt for: ‘Timekeeping’.
The contemporary judges were looking for a piece with x-factor and found it in Timekeeping. “We were looking for individualism confidently expresses through media, that is – a unique piece that has conceptual and aesthetic resolve.” Timekeeping excited the judges with the way in which Walker-Holt treated the recycled household materials the same way precious metals and stones are treated in the best of fine jewellery.
“The solutions Walker-Holt used to construct her piece are not accidental, but in fact are the result of careful decision making. The aesthetic seems to come out of a DIY vernacular, and assemblage of parts reflects a resourceful keen eye and hand.”
Walker-Holt explains the inspiration behind Timekeeping “The worn and used aesthetic I create is reflective of my ethics. I want value to ultimately lie in an objects sense of endurance through its patina and though time honoured craft techniques.”

Judges; Karl Fritsch and Areta Wilkinson

Wednesday, August 3, 2011

2011 Graduating Students Award

1 August to 12 August 2011

Thanks to all those who came to the opening on Monday night, it is nice to know I am well supported by friends, peers and lecturers especially Fran Allison and Mary Curtis. It was also great to meet and catch up with the other graduates; Kvetoslava Flora Sekanova, Jessica Winchcombe and yang Zhang.

Check out the awesome images courtesy of Fingers;
http://www.fingers.co.nz/exhibition_program.htm

Wednesday, July 13, 2011

New Zealand Jewellery Show 2011







Some quick fire images of my piece before it flew to Wellington for the 2011 Contemporary Jewellery Awards where I am one of four finalist in this section with; Jane Dodd , Matthew McIntyre Wilson, Kvetoslava Flora Sekanova.





Monday, July 11, 2011

Neckware 8, Masterworks


Neckware 8
Group Jewellery Show
Thu, 7 Jul 11 - Sun, 24 Jul 11
Masterworks Gallery Ponsonby

Sarah Walker-Holt, Fiddlesticks, 2011

wood, vintage thread, copper, brass


Embracing my bricolage practice, I have utilised and dissected wooden kitchen utensils and reconfigured them into a single piece of jewellery. By giving the wearer options as to how it can be worn initiates a relationship with the piece. I have not dictated which is the back or the front while at the same time it can be worn either around the neck, by unravelling the cotton, or as a brooch. The brooch pin is not apparent as it is a nut and bolt that is hidden within the two pieces that complete it. The nut and bolt are a motif within my work that once again speaks of bricolage, by taking this mechanism from its everyday context and subjecting it into another where it is not ordinarily understood.



Lucy Pierpoint is also in Neckware 8, demonstrating her desire to transform obsolete technology materials into something precious by unearthing a form of splendour that lies within.


Lucy Pierpoint, Defy Obsolescence ,2011, audio tape, silver plate


Lucy will also be exhibiting her exciting and alluring current exploration with discarded Television sceens at Masterworks. Thu, 28 Jul 11 - Wed, 24 Aug 11

Sunday, July 10, 2011

Brooch of the Month Club 2011

http://broachofthemonth.com/2011/06/29/sarah-walker-holt/

Currently I am pleased to relay that Kristin D'Agostino and her entourage have invited me to participate in the 3rd Annual collaborative BOM project. Having watched the scheme grow over the past 3 years I can see how it has evolved nicely, as I expected Kristen intended, bringing New Zealand Contemporary Jewellery makers together with it’s patrons and admirers, that in turn expose our unique creations to a broader audience.

In Peter Dormer’s and Ralph Turners 1994, Jewelry as Theatre: Radical Departures, they state that,

“We all know that jewelry, like anything else a person chooses to wear, tells us about that persons taste and personality. But jewelry is rarely used by jewelers to make comment about the conventions and taboos surrounding the making or wearing of it”.[1]

They go on to applaud Otto Künzli for, unlike others, addressing this as his context. As New Zealand contemporary jewelers of the 21st century this idea still prevails, purely from the perspective that as a culture the unawareness that is present around contemporary jewellery can be rather exasperating; I find myself consistently resisting the urge to justify to the layman why my art sits on the body.

People generally ask “why wear it?” but I ask “why not wear it?” One of the reasons I create my own pieces is a response to rejecting the “norm” or the “beige-ness” of a society in which I see us consumed. Just because a material object is created for a particular purpose doesn’t mean to say that this is where it should stay, I’m all for appropriating.

Doing something different takes courage and it is with great pleasure that I witness the pieces bravely worn by the wearers, commandeered by BOM, paraded in the wider community. I hope that this project antagonizes perceptions of what is acceptable or overlooked in our everyday, in the same way that fine art is used as a tool to question our awareness. Different isn’t something that should be treated with contempt but something that should be embraced and Kristen’s project definitely encourages this while exposing a great opportunity to constructively critique both the wearing and making of our work and hearten the contemporary jewellery community aspect of the applied arts.


[1] Dormer, P and Turner, R. (1994). Jewelry and dissent: Recent directions. In The New Jewelry: Trends+Traditions (rev.ed) (p178-184). London, England: Thames and Hudson

Sunday, March 20, 2011

Objectspace; Best in Show


2011 has brought a significant start to my professional development, as I was one of sixteen applied arts graduates chosen from tertiary institutions around New Zealand to exhibit in Objectspace’s - Best in Show 2011. http://www.objectspace.org.nz/programme/show.php?documentCode=2550
http://www.objectspace.org.nz/programme/works.php?documentCode=2556
Curator Matt Blomeley puts this annual event together and it is well worth visiting as it exposes New Zealand’s most recent emerging practitioners in their individual fields. Along with this years exhibit the students are to be showcased in the latest Threaded Magazine (issue 10).







Images courtesy of Objectspace



Tuesday, January 4, 2011

Situational Personalities




A conversation between Artist Sarah Walker-Holt & object wearer Lisa Carlin

SWH. I’m going to give you an object to wear and I’m going to explain to you how it works.
LC. I put a cardi on.
SWH. It completely comes apart.
LC. I see.
SWH. And you can reconfigure it.
LC. Oh, so I can design it?
SWH. Sort of, yeah, you can pick ‘n’ choose how many pieces you use and which ones you put together.


SWH. So when you wear it, because it’s not conventional in how it’s worn, you can push it through buttonholes, on jackets.
LC. Oh, ok. So this is the main piece?
SWH. Well, it can be what ever piece you want; you can have a piece on the inside of your cardigan.
LC. Ok.
SWH. And if you get one of the ones that have got like the button on it, so it works a bit like a button and buttonhole, you have to be prepared for it to stretch your cardigan, but it will go back.
LC. Oh, ok, that’s ok.


LC. I guess, I think, it would be, it’s quite good because your personality would come through, with the way that you put it on.
SWH. Yeah, it would, wouldn’t it.
LC. Because, if you were, like, quite a tidy perfectionist person, you would have one, but when you where not a perfectionist, you, I’d say you would quite like to have them like this, all over you.
SWH. That one, that one hasn’t got the knob on it.
LC. Right, this has a knob.
SWH. But you could undo your buttons and push the loop.
LC. So I quite like the idea of them spread around.


LC. There you go. I wonder if you could put that one through that one, loop it off like that – oh! It’s like a toy; it’s quite cool, isn’t it.


LC. I’d quite like to have one here, but can’t really attach it, unless, I push it through the wool, are you allowed to do that?
SWH. Yeah, yeah, but your cardigan isn’t like an open weave is it?
LC. So, you had all this on one brooch? I don’t know how you did it – now how did you do it, with um, which side did you have on the inside?
SWH. Ah, I would have had one flat one, one flatish one, on the inside, with a centre hole.
LC. It’s like a puzzle.
SWH. Um.
LC. Oh, I never tried to put it on one, there’s no way I could do that, try putting it all on one, there’s, I’ve got to try and make it before I put it on this time.
SWH. Yeah, that was – seems to be how I do it for some reason.
LC. Yeah, I automatically thought that you create it on you.


LC. It’s like treasure.
SWH. That, actually that’s, ah that’s nice coz I haven’t done it all dangly like that.
LC. Makes you realise all people are different, doesn’t it. Right I don’t know if I should add, should I add all of them on? Or stop?
SWH. Well I suppose you could always just see what it’s like at that point – decide how it hangs.


LC. Um, I need – to attach that to there – right – nearly ready.


LC. How’s that look? Ok?
SWH. Looks great.
LC. Now I haven’t used these ones, I’m sorry about that.
SWH. Haha.
LC. Yeah, it’s just that.