Brooch, 2020.
Each side is 1.75” x 1.75”.
Sterling silver, vitreous enamel, steel, raw sapphire, N95 mask material, social media post, iphone photo, found photo; etched, torch fired, hand fabricated.
This 2-piece brooch is meant to reflect our divided views about the pandemic and consider our behavior through a lens of how history will judge us for it.
On the right, I inscribed an actual Facebook post but presented it in handwriting as if written 100 years ago. It reads:
“I do not believe asymptomatic spread is real. I am not wearing a mask. If you disagree, don’t clutter my feed with your opinion because I give zero shits.”
The ground of the post is deteriorating to create a sense of it being unearthed in the future – and, to imply the very foundation of society eroding. Below the post rests a raw sapphire “submit” button. On the back, a “profile photo” – but the man is clearly from a bygone era.
On the left, a windowsill frames the outdoors. A slat reveals the fibrous material of an N95 mask, mounted and displayed in the same way as the precious sapphire; this calls into focus the sudden shift of what was valuable when N95 masks cost more per gram than precious gems.
I inserted “walls” between the two halves of the piece, showing at once the isolation of the pandemic, and the growing division among one another – yet, the two are inextricably connected by a chain, a situation we cannot ignore nor escape in a time of viral spread.
For of my work throughout the 2020 pandemic, see my Holding Light, Requiem, and Charity Collections,
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