Past Exhibitions
Plan B Art Project
Heidi Lowe Gallery is hosting Plan B Art Project, a traveling Contemporary jewelry exhibition, from October 8th through November 8th, 2022 at her space in Lewes, DE. There will be an opening reception on Saturday, October 8th, 5-7 pm. The curator of the exhibition, Shauna Blythe Burke, states that “Plan B” is an Art Statement to raise money for and awareness of Planned Parenthood and issues surrounding a person’s right to make choices about one’s own body.” Twenty-five percent of all artwork sales will be donated to Planned Parenthood.
The title of the show, Plan B, refers to a type of emergency birth control medication (aka the Morning After Pill) that can be taken to prevent pregnancy. Throughout history, there have been various forms of a ‘plan B’ and many cultures used medicinal herbs to end pregnancies, sometimes with poisonous or deadly results. The amphora bottle which dates back to ancient Greece was used as artistic inspiration for this show to symbolize vessels that were used to contain herbs and medicines.
For this project, Burke invited artists to transform a cast silver amphora bottle or use their own interpretation of Plan B as a starting point to create a unique wearable or sculptural object. As Burke observes “[a]rt has always been a symbolic tool to bring societal injustices to light.” Plan B Art Project is a poignant example of this notion by representing over 60 artists’ voices. The art objects in this exhibition are symbols of protest against the threats and abolishment of the rights to access a safe and legal abortion and reproductive healthcare in the United States.
Plan B Art Project was shown at Ombre Gallery in Cincinnati and then at Pistachios Gallery in Chicago during the summer of 2022. After being exhibited at Heidi Lowe Gallery from October 8- November 8, it will be shown at Pratt University in Brooklyn, NY by Shauna Blythe Burke during NYCJW (New York City Jewelry Week, November 14th-20th, 2022).
Photos by Cole Rodger
Artists:
Debra Adelson, Steve Alexis, Rachel Atherley, Karen Bachmann, Krista Bermeo, BiraBiro, Hannah Blount, Belle Brooke, Ashley Buchanan, Shauna Burke, David Butler, Jessica Calderwood, Shelly Cavanaugh, Liz Clark, Kelly Jean Conroy, Luana Coonen, Julian De La Garza, Umut Demirgüç, Ben Dory, Brie Flora, Brice Garrett, Sara Giordano, David Giulietti, Joanna Gollberg, Stefan Gougherty, Jill Baker Gower, Mia Hebib, LeeAnn Herreid, Russell Jones, Jacob Keleher, Shana Kroiz, Lynn Latta, Maia Leppo, Cindy Liebel, Thomas Mann, Sharon Massey, Michel McNabb, Tom Muir, Ayala Naphtali, Rachel Quinn, Monique Rancourt, Melinda Risk, Emily Rogstad, Cyd Rowley, Linda Savineau, Biba Schutz, Leslie Shershow, Rebecca Strzelec, Didi Sudyam, Kelly Ann Temple, Billie Theide, James Thurman, Yuri Tozuka, Munya Avigail Upin, Francesca Vitali, Maya Rose Weiss, Sam Woerhmann, Liaung-Chung Yen
Earrings Galore 2021-2022
Earrings Galore, Heidi Lowe Gallery’s signature annual juried exhibition, is a rich and diverse array of earrings made by emerging and established studio jewelers. Each artist’s unique approach to the earring format will be represented in a cohesive grouping of earrings. The exhibition is intended to create more access for the public to see art jewelry, cultivate connections with the community and provide an opportunity for visitors to add new pieces to their jewelry collections.
Enlilghtenment : Stacey Lee Webber
This classically inspired collection was designed using unique freshwater pearls, hand sawn vintage silver coins featuring Lady Liberty, and 14 karat vermeil.
Stacey Lee Webber was born in Indianapolis, IN, in 1982. She received her BS at Ball State University, Muncie, IN, (2005) and her MFA at the University of Wisconsin,Madison, WI (2008). In 2009, she was awarded a yearlong residency at Lill Street Art Center in Chicago, IL. In order to pursue her dream of becoming a full-time artist, she later moved to Philadelphia, PA., where after four bustling years of teaching while working as a production jeweler, her dream came to fruition in 2015.
Webber's work pushes the boundaries of everyday recognizable objects to the point of unidentifiable.Through material, she strives to make artwork that challenges viewers’ preconceived notions of the objects that surround them.
Mineral Instincts : Aimee Petkus & Anna Johnson
AIMEE PETKUS "My background in geology combined with my desire to create, manifests itself in the work that I make. I take the unique, magical, and mesmerizing world of rocks, gems and minerals, and present them in a way that sparks a curiosity in the stones that are being worn. I am inspired by the vast canvas nature provides, where one will find geometric patterns, order and repetitive elements along with haphazard, disordered chaos. I combine geometric and organic forms to show the duality of art and science within my life, but also to mimic these juxtapositions as found in nature."
ANNA JOHNSON Through adornment I strive to highlight the incredibly high value of nature. Jewelry has provided me with a platform to interpret a survey of plant and animal life mixed with gems and minerals in a way that creates a direct and intimate connection with its viewers and wearers. As an artist my intention is to create soulful pieces that present nature in an unfamiliar context that will perhaps trigger people to make more conscious efforts to protect the environment. There is intense beauty all around us, I hope we, as a culture, can learn to see it and form a mutualistic relationship within it and as well as between ourselves.”
Earrings Galore 2019-2020
The objective of Earrings Galore is to show rich and diverse examples of earrings madeby emerging and established studio jewelers. Although each jeweler’s artisticintent maybe specific, the show consists of a broad range of thoughtful work. The exhibition createsaccess for the public to engage with art jewelry for the first time or to add to theircollection. Featuring 53 artists from around the world, Earrings Galore 2019 will be onview at Heidi Lowe Gallery throughout the year, with pop-ups in Chicago and New YorkCity
Subtle Fictions : Alexandra Hopp & Lydia Martin
My recent work explores how Obsessive Compulsive Disorder relates to myself, the culture at large, and especially its relationship to the identity and practices of the goldsmith. I make visible the never-ending repetitive behavior and attention to infinitesimal details, both of which the goldsmith and the Obsessive Compulsive Disorder sufferer exhibit, and to their shared attention of the smallest details that the average person would overlook. The habits of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder and the practice of the goldsmith are strikingly similar: Both engage in repeated, ritualized activity ad infinitum, both are obsessed with notions of control and with minute details. The only difference is that the former is characterized as a disorder while the latter is seen as a certain temperament beneficial to the goldsmith. I use the traditional jewelry forms, techniques, materials, and visual vocabulary of the goldsmith in such profusion that their original functions are lost and they become an exercise in mania. Detail is an important factor. Obsessives and goldsmiths attach great importance to minutiae that the "normal" person would overlook. My attempt is to make the importance of these seemingly arbitrary details visible to the viewer. Through a strategy of repetition and exaggeration, this work manifests the characteristics of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder in Materials form. My intention is to positively reframe perceptions ofOCD characteristics by recognizing its inevitability in the skills of the goldsmith, contemporary culture, and in artistic practice.
-Alexandra Hopp
As a maker, I have become increasingly aware of the relationship between my hands and the jewelry I make. There is a shadowed space between maker and made, often meant to be invisible to both the trained and untrained eye. This space has always been uncomfortable for me, as a jeweler, as accuracy does not come naturally. However, it is from within this boundary that I have begun to find something honest. Paying careful attention to my material, sterling silver, I manipulate it in order to break, then repair and reconstruct, making something whole that had been turned into fragments. It is within this evidence, the evidence of my own hand, that my boundaries as a maker, wearer, and thinker become clear and find a voice within the jewelry I make.
-LYDIA MARTIN
(un)natural : Jina Seo & Lindsay Locatelli
The extraordinary power of objects is obtained because people believe in them. The more mundane the objects are, the more powerful they become. My practice contextualizes the embodied energy that is submerged beneath the layers of vintage leather gloves. The fragments of ordinary gloves convey a tactile and erotic interaction, emphasizing the physical movements between certain parts of body and garments. When the body is absent, the empty, internal structure retains evidence of human existence. It remains full of authentic spirit and fantasy. Through the processes of deconstructing and reconstructing materials into symbolic forms, I uncover the intimate and sensual power of humanity. The individual records and stories from the gloves turn into something that is universally relatable. Yet, it loops back to the idea of private at the same time. When the broad concept of primitive and elemental human desire meets the audience or wearer, it encourages them to find his or her own sensations and conclusions of desire. It is a moment when ordinary objects become surreal and uncanny in order to redeem the socially constructed expectations and perceptions.
-JINA SEO
I'm drawn to creating contemporary art jewelry highlighting nature's bold spirit and kinetic presence.Artistic visual cues range from the south western's boundless sun-drenched blue skies, contrasting mountain-scapes, scaffolding cactus skeletons, bleached bones to neon desert blossoms. Wearing the work activates a tactile experience and animates these ideas as an adornment. My jewelry largely becomes mobile bodies of wearable art; inviting the view to interact as the user and observer.
-LINDSAY LOCATELLI
Arrayed : Rod McCormick
I like resistant media. Pushing against a recalcitrant material forces one to define and clarify one's ideas. As an art school student I took to metal and to this day there is nothing I like better than beating metal sheet with hammers and chasing tools. Years later I decided to try my hand at 3D
computer modeling. I found that I took to digital design-as it turns out, CAD programs are also recalcitrant in a charming way. My current work is 3D printed jewelry. What drew me to metal, to Craft, was the idea of thinking through making. The possibility of finding ideas in material and process. I respond to computer modeling programs in a similar fashion. My work is often inspired by the personality of the software; the pieces are improvisations of non-materials and process.
CrossPASS : Demitra Thomloudis & Motoko Furuhashi
CrossPASS is a project featuring collaborative and individual works by artists Demitra Thomloudis and Motoko Furuhashi that examine place through expanded media and the intimate lens of jewelry and small objects.The project targets a distinctive stretch of the Interstate 10 corridor that connects the unique borderplex region of El Paso, Texas to Las Cruces, New Mexico. The objective of CrossPASS is to allow site-specific locations and the artists’ shared personal inquiries along this route to initiate a collection of images, video and sound that directly influences the creation of jewelry and objects. The viewer is asked to not only join in the artists' investigation of this land awash with dramatic terrain, vernacular structures and a multitude of boundaries, but also discover these sites through the body.
