Hand Pendant — Lisa Walker (2010)
A contemporary jewellery pendant cast from an anatomical model of a human hand, made with Wellington-based jeweller Lisa Walker.
Lisa Walker is a contemporary jeweller based in Wellington, New Zealand.
"Walker uses a vast range of materials and construction methods. She creates objects that consciously simmer with influences from all aspects of culture and life. The pieces are often laced with references to contemporary jewellery of the past forty years, as she questions and researches what jewellery means and what it could be. Walker largely positions her work around the history, the future and the boundaries of jewellery." — Lisa Walker
Human Dynamo Workshop worked with Walker to cast the Hand Pendant from an anatomical model of a human hand — a small-scale fabrication brief that drew on our experience with mould-making, casting and fine finishing. The finished pendants live somewhere between medical reference and personal adornment, which is precisely where the work is intended to sit.
"The pendant, made from an anatomical model, switches from a medical science narrative to the language of adornment. And yet the reproduction of a human hand in this way plays on the emotions. It's unsettling, but Walker touches and expands on the history of jewellery and its connection to the human body."
— Justine Olsen, Curator Decorative Art and Design, Te Papa Museum
