Mike & Maaike, a San Francisco studio led by Mike Simonian and Maaike Evers, fashion flat leather necklaces and broaches based on pixilated photos of famous jewelry (Daisy Fellowe's "Tutti Frutti" necklace, Imelda Marcos's ruby necklace, the Hope Diamond) found via Google image searches. Mariana Acosta Contreras of Providence strings folded leather into scarf-like necklaces resembling strands of flowers or shelf mushrooms. They often have a neutral main color (gray, white) with bright hues (reds, greens) flaring from inside folds.
Islay Taylor of Providence crochets webs of thread to hold cascading strands of orange and red beads. San Francisco's Emiko Oye turns Legos into bright, blocky, fun bracelets. One cheekily puns on Mondrian's blocky early 20th-century abstractions. RISD-trained Jimin Park's broaches look as if she's fashioned bits of metal and fluorescent plastic junk she picked up off the street into Post-Modern tribal talismans. Oye and Park's work highlights a distinguishing characteristic of this jewelry: a spirit of play.
Read Greg Cook's blog at gregcookland.com/journal.
Topics:
Museum And Gallery
, Photography, Museums, Architecture, More 
, Photography, Museums, Architecture, Providence Preservation Society, Frank Mullin, Brian McDonald, Art, galleries, Adam Hall, Andrew Dernavich, Less 
