Vera Siemund: New Goldsmith Laureate of Hanau

Artist list

Vera Siemund

Every two years since 2004, the City of Hanau has named a Goldsmith Laureate who works for several weeks at the Staatliche Zeichenakademie, holding a workshop for the students there, and who presents his or her works in an exhibition at the Deutsches Goldschmiedehaus.  

Last year, the jury elected Vera Siemund of Hamburg as the Goldsmith Laureate of the City of Hanau for the year 2013.

After completing her training as a goldsmith from 1991 to 1995 at the Staatliche Zeichenakademie Hanau, the artist studied at the famous College of Art and Design in Halle under Professor Dorothea Prühl. During the last twelve years, the artist has participated with her works in numerous exhibitions in both Germany and abroad and important jewelry galleries in Europe and the U.S.A. have presented her in one-man-shows. In 2002, Vera Siemund was honored with the first prize in the competition announced by the City of Hanau, and in the same year, she received the second prize in the Youth Promotion Competition for Jewelry, Hollow- and Flatware which was presented by the Society for Goldsmiths’ Art in cooperation with the Bertha Heraeus and Kathinka Platzhoff Foundation.

The fascination of the romantic, the nostalgic demands of the Historic Revival Period, dominates in Vera Siemund’s jewelry pieces; historical ideals gain a new dimension. She skillfully utilizes individual elements which she transmutes and puts into a completely new context. Iron, which was a popular material in the 19th Century, as well as copper, is particularly appealing to the artist. The material is sawed, chased and bored, but embossing and imprinting also play an important role in the opulent necklaces or in the brooches designed with emphatic plasticity. For well-balanced color accents, the artist likes to utilize industrial enamel or to include single stones in prominent positions.