Remnants and Relics by Jason Stein

Artist list

Jason Stein

The central themes I explore with my work and studio practice are the ideas of control, chance, and failure both in the physical world around us and within our own consciousness. I am fascinated by means of control we encounter and the overt and covert influence of the unseen structures and systems of everyday existence that modify our experiential reality.
 
I collect and catalogue found objects and materials that speak to my visual and conceptual framework of control, hidden systems and structures, and the aesthetics of chance and time. I enjoy the process of deconstructing a found object into its constituent parts and manipulating the structure and form to subvert its original aesthetics and function. I also study and explore the process of casting metal and using heat and fire to modify and reconstitute metal components through the careful application of brazing, fusing, and melting processes. My work is also inspired by the textures and forms of the natural world and the geological structures and surfaces that occur. I am drawn to the subtleties in such hard and unforgiving materials and landscapes, and I strive to find the beauty and elegance in often overlooked remnant materials and structures.
 
I intend to create juxtapositions and states of conflict and interplay between disparate elements such as order and chaos, the industrial versus organic, and the talisman and the relic. I push materials and processes to their breaking point and then use the resulting textures and structures as the starting points and components for new pieces. This chaotic and intense process of alchemy and creation gives birth to new forms and ways of thinking about beauty and adornment, sustainability, the reuse of objects and materials, and my creative studio process. The result is finished works that speak to my visual and conceptual framework of control, hidden systems and structures, manipulation, and transformation.

Jason Stein is a jeweller and metalsmith based in Matthews, North Carolina, in the United States. He received his BFA in Metals and Jewelry Design from the Rochester Institute of Technology in 2008 and received his MFA in Metal Design from East Carolina University in 2010. He works full-time as a bench and custom jeweller in Charlotte, NC and taught jewellery and metalsmithing classes at Central Piedmont Community College from 2017-2021. His work has been featured in national and international exhibitions such as Metamorphoses at the Bayerischer Kunstgewerbeverein (Bavarian Craft Council) in Munich, Germany, for Munich Jewellery Week in 2022, Until Death Do Us Part, Painful Hope, and Broken Beauty at Alliages Gallery in Lilles, France and other European venues in 2020-2022, and Craft Forms 2017 and 2018 at Wayne Art Center in Wayne, PA. He has completed artist residencies at Penland School For Craft in 2020, Peters Valley School of Craft in 2021, and Pocosin Arts in 2022 and his work is in the collection of the Mint Museum of Craft and Design in Charlotte, NC.