C. James Meyer

Bio

C. James Meyer is professor emeritus at Virginia Commonwealth University where he was head of the metals and jewelry program. He currently maintains a studio and continues to teach part-time, including in the University of Georgia Studies Abroad Program in Cortona, Italy, as well as conducting workshops at the Penland School of Crafts and Peters Valley Craft Center. His work has been exhibited extensively both nationally and internationally and is in private and public collections including the Museum of Arts and Design, N.Y., the Racine Museum of Art, Wisc., the Georgia Museum of Art, Ga., the Gregg Museum, N.C. and the Nordenjelske Museum of Applied Art in Norway. Additionally, Meyer's work has been acknowledged through grants, fellowships and publication.

Statement

Making Time and Place
I intend the pieces in this current body of work to be seen as “visual postcards”; intimate sculptures that document a specific time and place. While these pieces represent specific experiences for me. I feel that the nature of the work could be universal, and therefore the specific reason for creating a work would not be essential to the viewer. The work begins with an event I choose to document. Sometimes found objects are selected; other times I am just recalling a particular observation. I do not use a camera, as I do not want the objects to be actual reproductions from nature. I am searching for the fine line where nature informs the visual vocabulary without literal translation. All of these objects either incorporate. or are, individual pieces of adornment… usually rings or brooches. To me such objects evoke qualities of nostalgia and sentiment. This is why jewelry is often given to mark specific occasions, something that further reinforces the idea of documentation, of marking time and place

 

CV