Jewellery SA: Is Contemporary Jewellery Alive or Dead?

The Jewellery SA group had it's 4th meeting last night at Gray Street Work shop. In Melbourne at the same time last night a lecture was being held at RMIT as a fundraiser for the RMIT Gold & Silversmithing 2011 graduate exhibition. Four internationally acclaimed luminaries of the jewellery world, goldsmith Robert Baines, artist and curator Susan Cohn, jeweller Benjamin Lignel, and art historian and curator Damian Skinner spoke on the topic, ‘The contemporary jewellery movement is more alive than dead’.
We thought it would be interesting to have a satellite discussion on the same topic because over the past ten years I have gnashed and grinded this topic to a pulp with my best friend and jeweller Jane Bowring. I really wanted other makers perspectives on how they view themselves and what Contemporary Jewellery means to them. Here are some of the thoughts that came up...