''Bone Stone Shell: New Jewellery New Zealand'' was a 1988 exhibition of contemporary New Zealand jewellery and carving which toured internationally. The exhibition is seen as capturing a moment when New Zealand jewelers started looked less at European traditions and precious materials and more at Pacific traditions and natural materials.

Development

The exhibition was developed by New Zealand's Craft Council (later absorbed into

Creative New Zealand The Arts Council of New Zealand Toi Aotearoa (Creative New Zealand) is the national arts development agency of the New Zealand government established in 1963. It invests in artists and arts organisations, offering capability building programmes a ...

) for the

Ministry of Foreign Affairs In many countries, the ministry of foreign affairs (abbreviated as MFA or MOFA) is the highest government department exclusively or primarily responsible for the state's foreign policy and relations, diplomacy, bilateral, and multilateral r ...

to "show overseas audiences the new and important direction of New Zealand jewellery". It was shown in Asia, Australia and New Zealand over a five-year period. It was curated by artist John Edgar with a selection panel consisting of Edith Ryan, craft programme manager, QE II Arts Council; James Mack, director of the

Dowse Art Museum The Dowse Art Museum is a municipal art gallery in Lower Hutt, New Zealand. Opening in 1971 in the Lower Hutt CBD, The Dowse occupies a stand-alone building adjacent to other municipal facilities. The building was completely remodelled in 2 ...

; and jeweller Kobi Bosshard. Twelve artists were eventually selected and they made over 40 new pieces of work in total from bone, stone and shell. Artists were given a brief around materials:

The materials, Bone (
ivory Ivory is a hard, white material from the tusks (traditionally from elephants) and Tooth, teeth of animals, that consists mainly of dentine, one of the physical structures of teeth and tusks. The chemical structure of the teeth and tusks of mamm ...
, beef, whale), Stone (
argillite Argillite () is a fine-grained sedimentary rock composed predominantly of Friability, indurated clay particles. Argillaceous rocks are basically lithified muds and Pelagic sediment, oozes. They contain variable amounts of silt-sized particles. T ...
,
greywacke Greywacke or graywacke ( ) is a variety of sandstone generally characterized by its hardness (6–7 on Mohs scale), dark color, and Sorting (sediment), poorly sorted angular grains of quartz, feldspar, and small rock fragments or sand-size Lith ...
,
nephrite Nephrite is a variety of the calcium, magnesium, and iron-rich amphibole minerals tremolite or actinolite ( aggregates of which also make up one form of asbestos). The chemical formula for nephrite is Ca2( Mg, Fe)5 Si8 O22(O H)2. It is on ...
,
jade Jade is an umbrella term for two different types of decorative rocks used for jewelry or Ornament (art), ornaments. Jade is often referred to by either of two different silicate mineral names: nephrite (a silicate of calcium and magnesium in t ...
) and Shell will predominate, although not exclusively. Other complementary materials will be silver, wood, plastic, fibre etc.

''Bone Stone Shell'' was designed to show new way of thinking about materials and place in New Zealand contemporary jewellery. It showed New Zealand artists taking inspiration from the history of Maori and Pacific adornment, rather than just Western traditions, and the use of local materials like paua shell and pounamu, rather than the precious stones and metal of European jewellery. As curator John Edgar wrote in the exhibition catalogue:

This exhibition is about awareness – of our heritage of Western civilisation and our cultural environment in the
South Pacific The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five Borders of the oceans, oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean, or, depending on the definition, to Antarctica in the south, and is ...
; of our place in the twentieth century and the values necessary to survive the nuclear age; of the delicate fragility of our ecology and our relationship to the natural materials and the non-renewable resources of our region; of the celebration of the forces that formed these materials and the life within them; and, of the ability to communicate in objects of beauty, spirit and power.

Legacy

After the conclusion of the touring show, the pieces were acquired by the Friends of Te Papa for the

Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa The Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa is New Zealand's national museum and is located in Wellington. Usually known as Te Papa ( Māori for ' the treasure box'), it opened in 1998 after the merging of the National Museum of New Zealand ...

. In 2013/14 Te Papa restaged the works from ''Bone Stone Shell'' alongside more recent pieces of contemporary jewellery and pieces from its Maori and Pacific collections.

Artists included in ''Bone Stone Shell''

* Paul Annear * Hamish Campbell * Michael Couper *

John Edgar (sculptor) John Stanley Edgar (26 December 1950 – 3 April 2021) was a New Zealand sculptor and medallist. Early life and education Born in Auckland on 26 December 1950, Edgar was educated at Mount Albert Grammar School and then the University of New ...

Warwick Freeman Warwick Stephen Freeman (born 5 January 1953) is a New Zealand jeweller. Biography Freeman was born in Nelson, New Zealand, Nelson in 1953, and was educated at Nelson College from 1966 to 1970. He began making jewellery with Peter Woods in Pert ...

Eléna Gee Eléna Gee is a New Zealand jeweller known for her combination of metal work with organic materials, specifically pāua shell. She was a prominent figure in the Bone Stone Shell, Bone, Stone, Shell movement in 1980s New Zealand. She has had a lo ...

* Dave Hegglun * Paul Mason * Roy Mason *

Alan Preston Alan Herbert Preston (29 October 1932 – 2 September 2004) was a New Zealand football (soccer) player and cricketer who represented the New Zealand national football team and played 38 first-class matches for Wellington and two for the North ...

* Jenny Pattrick * Inia Taylor

References

{{Reflist, 30em Art exhibitions in New Zealand 1998 in New Zealand

Development

Legacy

Artists included in ''Bone Stone Shell''

Further reading

References