The Impolite Body

A successful symposium took place in the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, in honour of the recipient of the biennial Françoise van den Bosch Award. The established international contemporary jewellery prize went to American artist Lauren Kalman. Two years ago, award recipient Lin Cheung was celebrated with a mini symposium, a format that has been repeated this year. Back then, the theme was crafts. This time the title was Designing Adornment, Questioning Beauty. Adornment and beauty were questioned from a bodily and gender perspective. Apart from keynote speaker Meredith Jones, an academic expert in feminist theories of both the body and media and communications, museum curator Amanda Pinatih took the stage, as did laureate Lauren Kalman herself and critical curator and art historian Manique Hendricks. In other words, this was the feminist edition.