Light Steel by Sawa Aso

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Sawa Aso

Sawa Aso was born in Japan, but later in life she had to travel quite a distance to obtain het bachelor and masterdegrees in jewellery design: all the way to the Burg Giebichenstein University in Halle, Germany, the city where she still lives. The 'utensils' she based her pieces on were first covered - giving a simplistic description - in tape, then she carefully removed that and used the shells as templates. She subsequently translated these to ultra-thin steel sheet. This process enabled her to reconstruct a feather light, monochrome version of the implement she had started out with. In doing so, she turned a everyday object into a piece of jewellery, and one which even proofs to be remarkably wearable. She (almost) also did the reverse: turning jewellery into an object. She meticulously reconstructed the traditional, achetypical solitair-ring using the thin steel sheet. All the usual components are there, but size and weight no longer live up to your expextations. Yet, they are actual rings you would love to put on your finger...

/ Ward Schrijver