For any jeweller, possessing a piece obtained by the Victoria and Albert Museum is a enormous deal. To have your get the job done shown along with historic objects and modern greats is validation of its relevance and relevance. From a late Bronze-age gorget located in Ireland to jewellery worn by Catherine the Wonderful of Russia, critical Art Nouveau items by Lalique through to British legends Andrew Grima and Elizabeth Gage, the assortment demonstrated in the William and Judith Bollinger Gallery really is unsurpassed. But one particular current acquisition is of particular great importance.
It has been an remarkable 10 months for London-dependent, Ghana-elevated jeweller Emefa Cole. She has absent from a pretty silent, nearly reclusive lifetime of staying an unbiased jeweller who exhibited at fairs and had a term-of-mouth clientele, to getting her do the job showcased in British Vogue and Self-importance Fair on Jewellery. Now, following a extended hold out owing to the pandemic, a ring from her Vulcan series is lastly on screen at the V&A.
Clare Phillips, curator at the museum and renowned jewellery historian and writer, came throughout Cole’s daring rings and cuffs at the Handmade Fair in London in November final calendar year. “I was bowled over by their attractiveness of kind and their perfection of end,” she recalls. “How her rings get the job done each on the finger and in the hand – their 3-dimensionality, their harmony, their electrical power.”
