‘Scandrett flavoured’ exhibition for Artist in Residence Lynn Kelly
Fossicking around the foreshore during her two month residency at Scandrett Regional Park inspired jeweller Lynn Kelly to create a suite of work for a touring exhibition.
‘A Different Land’ a jewellery exhibition inspired by her Scandrett time, opens at Fingers Gallery in Auckland on September 1.
Lynn's work is often inspired by plants and her jewellery frequently uses a mixture of organic and traditional materials. The raw materials found in her pieces include pumice, pebbles, ‘beached glass’, fishing line, seeds and lichen references. Maps with local place names, headland shapes and photos of Scandrett family members also feature.
A compilation of Lynn’s ‘Scandrett flavoured’ work has been exhibited at galleries throughout New Zealand during 2015. “Ideas from the Scandrett residency have continued to grow since spending time at the lovely bay,” Ms Kelly says.
“I have found the items I most connected with (often delightful treats found on the beach, both natural pieces and flotsam and jetsam) show up regularly, and not necessarily intentionally, in whatever I am working on.
The process or solution I use to complete one idea, finds its way into another and spreads like a web holding the thoughts and results together and showing how much my time in the north is affecting my jewellery.”
Each year Auckland Council selects an artist to live and work in an Auckland regional park. A different park is chosen every year to become home to the artist for an eight-week period. The artist creates a new body of work influenced in some way by the park, or by the residency experience, which is then shared with the public.
Residency Co-ordinator Michelle Edge says that Lynn embraces colour, texture and form in small, sometimes whimsical packages which are beautiful and wearable.
“They are made from, encapsulate or allude to small things we hold nostalgia for. Her work uncovers and re-works fine and delicate treasures we might normally overlook on a seaside stroll in a regional park,” she says.
Lynn Kelly’s exhibition is on from September 1-14 at Fingers Gallery, which specialises in contemporary New Zealand jewellery. Come meet, and have a chat with Lynn about her work on September 5, 12pm - 2pm at the gallery.
