Robert Baines
Jeweller
Published: 28.08.2026
rmit.edu.auBio
Living Treasure: Master of Australian Craft, goldsmith and emeritus professor at RMIT University, Robert Baines has maintained an international profile with exhibitions, awards, lectures and publications for more than fifty years. His works are in prestigious public collections in Great Britain, Germany, France, Poland, USA, New Zealand, and Australia.Statement
Broadly I have made pieces that manifest a chosen subject. A fundamental condition is that jewelry captures human drama and in that is a wealth of possibilities. There is an endeavor to build a contemporary statement referencing cultural history. There are dangers in this strategy as the work could be hastily dismissed because of its seeming preoccupation with historicity.My primary interest is in the history of the goldsmith and the artifact that makes it manifest. This basically starts with Bronze Age gold technology and the jewelry meanings over that broad period of Greek Gold of the High Classical Era (which includes the Etruscan period in particular). Subsequent jewelry histories have their wonder and offer abundant potential subjects to “play with.” Historical jewelry is a social and political document that is available to research, reinterpret, and question its authenticity.
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