During our 7th arnoldsche weekend art gallery in November 2018, we presented pieces of Gisbert Stach in the rooms of our publishing house.

This included schnitzel brooches, calamari pendants, fish finger brooches, pizza dough necklaces, matchbox cars with ambers, or a tree log with ingrown pearl strings. These pieces challenged the audience to question their traditional perception of jewellery, to reflect the social component of jewellery and therefore change and expand one’s own comprehension of jewellery in a demonstrative and lively way. Video art works such as “Fitting (Anprobe)” or “Untergang (Decay)” questioned the social, societal and economic meaning of jewellery and left a lasting impression on our visitors.

On the last day of the exhibition, we decided to premier a new performance as closing event. Here, the artist used a blowpipe to shoot at brooches and deform their surfaces in an artistic way. The wearer of the brooch stood protected behind a wooden wall, and only the brooch was pushed through a round hole in the wood. The impact of the small bullet from the blowpipe was very light; however, the effect on the surface of the piece of art was very intense, it showed deformations and chippings. Everyone who participated in this performance was able to purchase the brooch as individual artwork for 10 euros. Even weeks after the exhibition, I still saw some people wearing these brooches in the streets of Stuttgart.

The performance was a great success, the audience – from young to old, jewellery-savvy and artistically affine or not – were totally thrilled. This was a real happening where valueless round tin sheet buttons became entirely individual and person-related pieces of jewellery by means of this artistic performance. Gisbert Stach, who pursues the conceptional transformation and re-evaluation of useless things to a new sphere, gave his artistic oeuvre a new dimension with this performance – to the joy and excitement of everyone involved!

Gisbert Stach, one of the most important international exponents of conceptual jewellery, goes beyond the traditional boundaries of jewellery art with his unconventional, ingenious and humorous pieces.