Ela Bauer, winner of the Herbert Hofmann Preis 2026 interviewed for Klimt02

When asked about her background and artistic journey, Ela Bauer traces it back to her early years between Poland and Israel, where she grew up after her family immigrated when she was nine. It was in Jerusalem, while studying literature and Indian studies, that she first encountered jewellery almost by chance. She met a young man who supported himself by making and selling jewellery in the streets, using brass, alpaca and copper wire in a style reminiscent of Alexander Calder. Shortly after, she joined him, marking her first hands-on experience with making jewellery.
What began as a practical activity quickly turned into a fascination. The search for new forms, the combination of materials, and the invention of techniques became an engaging and enjoyable process that led her to pursue formal training at a technical jewellery school in Jerusalem. A decisive shift came later, when she discovered the work of artists such as Gijs Bakker, Pierre Degan, Paul Derrez and others. Confronted with these radically different approaches, she decided to go to an art school that could embody multiple visions and forms of expression.
This realization pushed her to leave Jerusalem for Amsterdam to study at the Gerrit Rietveld Academie. Since then, a central question has continued to shape her practice: what the boundaries of Jewellery are. A question that remains present somewhere in her work and process, as its definition constantly evolves.


When people ask about your work, how do you describe your practice and your artistic universe?
Ela Bauer: I often think of my studio as a forest, or a garden where things are growing; sometimes due to lots of care, attention and nourishment, and sometimes unnoticed, unattended, they pop up and are suddenly there as it were. It’s also a bit of a playground where you can try out things, combine different materials and dimensions, discover unexpected connections and see what happens… In my work, I see reflections of my thoughts materialized, but I also get many new insights. 
My work is a continuous process. I think that it’s a certain way of looking at things in general, almost automatically looking for metaphors in objects or combinations of objects and forms and connections between the things in the world and my own thoughts, ideas and work.



Ela Bauer in her studio.



What is your relationship with Schmuck? Is this your first time applying?
EB: My relation to Schmuck is… I think that Schmuck is an unparalleled, an unique institution!! I love the concept of it, that every year a different person makes the selection for the exhibition, which ensures that each year the quality of the selection stays unquestionable, yet the criteria have a different emphasis each year. Being selected to take part in the Schmuck exhibition is such a pleasure and honour! 
The contemporary jewellery festival that Schmuck became, with the satellite exhibitions all over Munich, grows with each year and inspires other cities all over the world (NY, Amsterdam, Vienna, London, Lisbon, Paris and more!) to organize this sort of jewellery events as well.
It’s not my first time at Schmuck; it keeps being very special each time that I’m selected.
Ela Bauer. Brooch: Untitled 3, 2025.
Resin, pigments and aluminium. Awarded: Herbert Hofmann Prize 2026.



Why do you make jewellery?
EB: I started making jewellery quite accidentally, but it captured and fascinated me, giving me much joy from the very beginning! I keep on making jewellery because, through the years, jewellery became my language, the language I speak best, I think. Jewellery is my reference, a framework within which I work and much of the content and meaning of my work comes through this framework; I enjoy thinking about the many visions on jewellery and what makes something into a jewel. The proximity, or maybe necessity, of the body (in its different forms) for something being called a jewel is a fascinating given. Dealing with scale of objects, with intimacy, the commitment one has to an object by wearing it and by that making it part of one’s identity fills me with great pleasure, wonder and gratitude (when it’s my jewel that’s worn).


What role does art play?
EB: Art, in its many forms, is an integral part of both my life and my work. I take great joy in looking at, listening to, reading, and experiencing works of art. At the same time, engaging with art sharpens my thinking, making it more analytical and focused, while also activating my intuition and heightening my emotional awareness.
For me, art exists on a level where things; objects, words, movements, and sounds do not merely point to themselves, but carry associative and metaphorical meaning. In this sense, a piece of jewellery can be a work of art just as much as a painting, sculpture, or musical composition. At the same time, any of these can also remain simply pleasant, shallow, or purely decorative.
I often find that the “eye of the beholder” plays a crucial role in how art is experienced and understood.


What do you defend?
EB: I don’t consciously defend anything… maybe the freedom and the need of (re)interpretation of the term Jewellery? 



  Ela Bauer's graduation project installation at the Gerrit Rietveld Academie, 1995. 



Do you have a project you haven’t realised yet?
EB: I’d love sometime to collaborate with one of the writers I love.
Also hmmmm…. I’d love to work with glass. The blow technique fascinates me, but casting glass as well. The fact that it’s such an ancient technique, even more so than smithing! It materializes for me the connection with our ancestors and the far past.


And what are your main sources of inspiration? And what about your heroes?
EB: I think that anything can inspire me if I am recipient to inspiration. Often, it’s a book I read or music I listen to, or a landscape, but often these are random combinations of forms or materials or colours I see, or words I hear, it can be anything really that, from a certain point, suddenly corresponds to something in me. 
Of course, many artists and art - in its many forms inspire me; Alicja Kwade, Philip Vermeulen, Anish Kapoor, William Faulkner, Kazuo Ishiguro, Karl Ove Knausgård, Philip Roth, Steve Reich, J S Bach and ... oh… so many more! 
The people who inspire me are more imaginary or potential friends than heroes. 

Ela Bauer. Neckpiece: Untitled, 2012
Polyurethane, polyamide, textile, pigments, jade.



After receiving this prize, what are your next plans? Do you have any upcoming exhibitions or projects you’d like to share?
EB: This spring I will show my work together with three other artists in the gallery Thereza Pedrosa in Asolo, Italy.

Coming August this year (2026), in cooperation with a colleague of mine Gésine Hackenberg and the platform for Jewellery education MASieraad, I will give a workshop in the countryside of the Netherlands, with the theme ‘Personal Archaeologies’ (check my Instagram account @elabauer8, there is still a possibility to apply!:). It’s a fascinating theme, in which we try to address this multifaceted and fluid term of ‘identity’ in all possible ways. By using the metaphor of Archaeology we want to draw attention to the process of permanent reconstruction we’re engaging with ourselves, trying to interpret and make sense of the traceable fragments of what we call ‘our identity’.

In the fall, together with The Pool, Amsterdam jewellery Collective of which I am part, I will exhibit my work in Paris, at the Institut Néerlandais, within the framework of Parcours Bijoux 2026.


© GHM. Herbert Hofmann Prize award ceremony at the special exhibition SCHMUCKmünchen: The prize winners from left: Mira Kim – Korea/Canada, Zhipeng Wang – China and Ela Bauer – Netherlands.

 

About the Interviewee

Ela Bauer was born in Poland and raised in Israel. She initially studied Comparative Literature and Indology at the University of Jerusalem before training in jewellery at a vocational school. In 1990, she moved to the Netherlands to attend the Gerrit Rietveld Academie, graduating in 1995. She continues to live and work in Amsterdam.
Her work is held in several major public collections, including the Museum of Art and Design, the Grassi Museum, the Pinakothek der Moderne, the Hiko Mizuno Collection in Tokyo, the Textile Museum Tilburg and the CODA Museum, as well as in numerous private collections.