“A piece of jewellery can be an expression of all kinds: a means for the wearer to declare themselves a member of a particular social class or group; to demonstrate wealth; to affirm an association with another person or a family; to proclaim difference or, indeed, sameness, by setting or following trends. Jewellery is rarely overtly associated with the political; it is more commonly perceived as a decoration or frivolity, a luxury, an addition to the necessity of clothing—something worn for its aesthetic value. We have long since disregarded the idea of jewellery as a fundamental means of displaying identity, but it is hard to find a culture that exists without any. And just as clothing is seen to be necessarily functional, in this society it is less and less so, and more of a luxury than ever. In a Western culture driven by consumption, the market and our wardrobes, drawers and dressing-tables are overflowing with possessions, far beyond our basic needs. And luxury goods are so readily available that we need never think beyond the transaction, over the counter or online, that adds one more superfluous thing to our hoard.

Yet any consumer item has a history of manufacture, from the sourcing of materials, through production, to distribution, which is shaped in part by socio-economic forces. Raw materials, whether hand-crafted and branded into a unique status symbol, or mass-manufactured into disposable high street goods, have a provenance which is at times questionable or exploitative; the market value of precious metals and stones is, in many parts of the world, rarely in proportion to the wages of those that mine and source them, and the damage to the environment is often, too, overlooked.

Shari Pierce’s work addresses the history of exploitation and the present political climate in both material, execution and concept. The title of her series Cardboard Democracies refers to those politically unstable states that lay claim to a democracy which, in practice, is rife with corrupt and coercive measures. It is perhaps, too, a pointed reference to democracy in general as a constructed ideology, a seemingly universal good which the West upholds as a panacea to the world’s problems, when in fact it might be argued that the buoyant economies upon which those very Western democracies are built are dependent upon the rich resources of far poorer states. This fragility is reflected in the materials she employs—cardboard, wire, paint—capable of holding a temporary shape but subject to wear and damage; offering a place of temporary refuge, but ultimately impermanent. In using cardboard, she is perhaps also making reference to homelessness and the privations of street living, testifying to those who are disenfranchised by consumer societies. The majority of the material she uses is found or given—old cans of housepaint, fake metal chains from old costume jewellery—so that she is reusing what is cast aside and refashioning it into something of value.

Starting with a cardboard box, sometimes “found while walking down the street… begging to be taken home”, she plays upon the different ways that an empty vessel, ultimately made to be disposed of when its purpose is served, can signify. As Pierce notes, we see these boxes discarded in heaps at the supermarket; but equally, they can be “temporary houses for our most important memories and possessions”, and, in the hands of a child, become a vehicle for imagination, with “limitless uses”—a fort, a castle, a car. In this way, then, this humble material is layered with meaning, in just the way that the material itself is constructed of layers of paper that can be “constructed and reconstructed multiple times”.

Creating cut-outs and shaped wire outlines of countries, states, and continents, she examines the notion of defined borders and imposed divisions—between peoples, lands, languages, and cultures. Taken as a pure outline, the recognisable shapes of these pieces, stripped of their geo-political origin, reveal the often arbitrary nature of those divisions, and question the authority behind mapping and the claiming of territory. Malleable and delicate in appearance, they reveal the instability of defined boundaries; and in reducing the proportions of these vast spaces to something that can be held and crushed in the hand, she questions their very substance. These small statements then, seemingly flimsy in form, take on the vast and intangible concepts of territory, history, and politics. No longer purely luxury items, this jewellery becomes a means of expressing ideas in a manner more commonly associated with fine art practice. And it is all the more effective in doing so by being worn upon the body, pinned or hung in the very places that we ordinarily wear our self-indulgence.” 

Text about Shari Pierce’s work, Borders and Cardboard Democracy, from New Directions in Jewelry II, Blackdog Publishing, pp. 139-141

Shari Pierce, USA.

Education:
2001– 07 Diplom/Master’s Degree Academy of Fine Arts, Munich, Germany, Department of Contemporary Jewelry under Professor Otto Künzli. Master Student
1994-99 East Carolina University, North Carolina, USA. Bachelor of Fine Arts 

Collections:
Collection Susan Beech, USA | Collection Koudijs/Schrijver, Amsterdam, The Netherlands | Marzee Sammlung, Galerie Marzee, Nijmegen, The Netherlands | UCE Private Art Collection, Munich, Germany

Selected Awards:
2007 “So Fresh” European Jewellery Award by Pierre Lang
2004 Erfurter Jewelry Symposium Scholarship

Solo Exhibitions:
2010 “Whitewash/ 34 Sexual Offenders and 2 Sexual Predators from Within a 5 Mile Radius”, Galerie Rob Koudijs, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
2009 “She LL Project”, Lothringerstr. 13, Contemporary Art Museum, Munich, Germany
2007 “Cardboard Democracy”, “So Fresh” Award Presentation, Semper Depot, Vienna, Austria | “Cardboard Democracy”, Galerie Rob Koudijs, Amsterdam, The Netherlands | “Cardboard Democracy”, Jewelers’ Werk Gallery, Washington D.C., USA
2005 “Fronteras: Borders: Grenzen”, Jewelers’ Werk Gallery, Washington D.C., USA

Selected Group Exhibitions:
2010 “SCOPE: 6 Artists/Designers Curated by Diane Pernet, Contemporary Art Fair, NYC, USA | “Adornment and Excess: Jewelry in the 21st Century”, Miami University Art Museum, USA
2009 “Paper Jewellery: Poor Jewellery”, Triennale Design Museum of Milan, Italy | “Nothing in Common”, KunstArkaden Contemporary Art Space, Munich, Germany | “Jewellery Extreme”, Maurer Zilloli Contemporary Arts, Munich, Germany
2008 “The Fat of Booty Madness”, Moderne Pinakothek Art Museum, Munich, Germany |“Schmuck 2008”, Traveling Exhibition- Germany, UK, Poland | BKV- Prize 2007 For Young Craft Artists, Finalist, Munich, Germany
2007 “So Fresh” Award Presentation, Semper Depot, Vienna, Austria | Guerrila Store, Unit F Fashion Festival, Vienna, Austria | “Tatort V”/ Bloody Mary”, Galerie Marzee, Nijmegen, The Netherlands | “SOFA”, Galerie Jewelers’ Werk Gallery, NYC, USA | “Coming Into View”, Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art, Oregon, USA | “Lass´den Sonnenschein herein”, Academy of Fine Arts, Munich, Germany
2006 “Tatort / Mark your Territory”, Galerie Marzee, The Netherlands | “Coming Into View”, Heidi Lowe- The Jewellery Studio, Delaware, USA | “SOFA”, Jewelers’ Werk Gallery, NYC, USA
2005 “Aufgebockt”, Academy of Fine Arts, Munich, Germany | “Tatort/Tatwort”, Galerie Marzee, Nijmegen, The Netherlands | “Schmuck 2005”, IHK Handwerksmesse, Munich, Germany | “Krieg und Frieden“, Galerie Im Chor, Schwäbisch Gmund, Germany | “Reconstruction/ Deconstruction”, Gallery Sztuki, Legnica, Poland | “SOFA”, Jewelers’ Werk Gallery, NYC, USA
2004 “Is there really cat in catfood?”, Academy of Fine Arts, Munich, Germany | “Tatort / VIP”, Galerie Marzee, Nijmegen, The Netherlands | “SOFA”, Jewelers’ Werk Gallery, NYC, USA | “Schmuck 2004”, IHK Handwerksmesse, Munich, Germany | “ZwischenSpiel”, Erfurter SchmuckSymposium, Erfurt, Germany | “Contact”, Mobiliia Gallery, Massachusetts, USA
2003 “Anello extra vergine”, Academy of Fine Arts, Munich, Germany | “Tatort / Koffer “,Galerie Marzee, Nijmegen, The Netherlands
2002 “from oo to oo”, Galerie Oona Berlin, Germany | “Schmuck”, Städtische Galerie im Cordonhaus Cham, Germany | “Ladies First”, Academy of Fine Arts, Munich, Germany | "12 ‘Ecoles Exposent Des Bijoux”, Geneva, Switzerland
2001 “New Metal/ Emerging Views”, Contemporary Crafts Gallery, Oregon, USA
2000 “Cross References”, University of Oregon, USA

Jewelers' Werk Galerie, Washington, D.C.
Galerie Rob Koudijs, Amsterdam. NL