Language & terminology: Jewelry or jewelry, is there a difference?
An expert in jewelry once told a lecture that using the term jewel (instead of gem) would be reason not to accept a son-in-law-to-be. Whew! For some, the distinction between jewelry and gems is apparently life-defining.
Random use of words?
Jewelry or jewelry: language & terminology, who determines the definitions? How are they used and how much value or meaning can you attach to them? And how universal or multilingual are they, those definitions? Or does arbitrariness sometimes rule?
Author jewelry, Autorenschmuck, authors jewellery, studio jewellery, artist jewelry, art jewelry or art jewelry, costume jewellery, contemporary jewelry, contemporary jewelry, jewelry, art jewelry, fashion jewelry, bijoux: what's the difference? In this forest of terms you quickly get lost. Pragmatic as I am, I then think: is it important, that distinction? What is a piece of jewelry more than an object to adorn yourself with? Does it matter whether it is intrinsically worthless or valuable? I don't think so. Every piece of jewelry is made and it cannot help but have been thought about the design and message, no matter how long or short. Point.
Objects to adorn man with
To put it clearly first: jewelry is meant to adorn, to decorate man. Almost a century ago (1924) Lady Caroline Henriette de Jonge, the first curator of fashion at the Centraal Museum, published the first book in the Netherlands devoted entirely to Dutch jewelry. In it she writes that jewelry is of all times and peoples and that jewelry is worn by people to distinguish themselves from others and or to demonstrate wealth or status. In addition, jewelry is worn as a talisman or has a religious meaning.
A good piece of jewelry focuses on the design, not the preciousness
De Jonge distinguishes jewelry made from inexpensive raw materials from precious ones as follows: with inexpensive materials, it is the design that matters and with precious materials, less processing is required and the materials speak for themselves. She also distinguishes the costly piece of jewelry from the jewelry worn daily. According to De Jonge, a good piece of jewelry is not necessarily made of noble materials: with a good piece of jewelry, it is the design that catches the eye and not as with a precious jewel which, according to her, "...derives its value only from a precious material, in which art has no part...". Other names De Jonge uses for jewelry are bijou de ville and arts and crafts jewelry; terms that have not been used for decades.
Marjan Unger also writes about the arbitrary use of definitions to describe jewelry in her 2010 dissertation. Whether the materials of a piece of jewelry are precious or worthless does not matter to her. What matters is the meaning and the message for both the wearer and the viewer.
Is jewelry always precious?
Regular distinctions are made based on the preciousness of the materials used: jewelry is made of precious metals and possibly precious stones. Jewelry can be made of any material. Really, it seems a tad arbitrary to me.
What is artist jewelry?
The term artist jewelry is often used to refer to jewelry designed or created by visual artists known primarily from sculpture or painting. Examples include Meret Oppenheim, Niki de Saint Phalle, Alexander Calder and Max Ernst. This term implies that other jewelry was not created by artists. That is quite a statement: my hand does not go into fire for it and I avoid the term.
International definitions
And how are the terms determined internationally? Here, too, the necessary confusion. To start close to home: in Flanders, there is talk of art jewelry while similar objects in the Netherlands are usually referred to as contemporary, modern or contemporary jewelry. In English, on the other hand, there is no distinction between jewelry or jewels: it's jewellery all the way, or for the Americans: jewelry, whether precious stuff is involved or not....
Fashion Jewelry
Can you call the necklace and matching dress by Gijs + Emmy from the Rijksmuseum collection acquired by the Rijksmuseum in 2017 costume jewelry? And is that the same as fashion jewelry? I don't believe so. While my sense of language and logic says that a piece of jewelry connected to a piece of clothing would be costume jewellery, I know that for many others it has a totally different connotation: fashion jewelry is subservient where it is primarily about the clothing. They are often sold in clothing stores and have a high turnover rate as a result of fashion seasons. They are also produced quickly and in large numbers from mostly inexpensive materials. But a fashion jewelry can be just as successful in design as a piece from a specialized gallery, as far as I am concerned.
Concepts change over time
Terms change over time. In the Central Museum's database, many pieces of jewelry are (still) named as women's braceletor women's ring. Terms that are increasingly difficult to sustain in the inclusive era we are slowly but surely heading toward.
In an interview by Carolin Denter on Klimt02 with Julia Wild (working at an art school in Idar-Oberstein), Wild speaks of shame among jewelry designers. According to her, there is a fear among artists of being "relegated" to design or fashion. Furthermore, she gives two other little-used designations for jewelry: gallery jewelry and academic jewelry. The terms contemporary or contemporary are dismissed by Wild as irrelevant. Rightly so: everything that once was or is contemporary may still be: simply because it exists. The name of my website notwithstanding....
When do you use jewelry and when jewelry?
Sometimes only insiders understand what is meant by jewelry or jewelry. Nonsense as far as I am concerned: it does not matter whether you wear diamonds and gold or a piece of plastic, tin, felt or glass.
Sometimes I think that all these terms were invented to exclude certain people or groups: an undesirable practice. Since I don't really believe in strict divisions (after all, everything flows) and above all I don't want to exclude anything or anyone I prefer to stick to the concept of jewelry.
Source: jewelry muse