WOW!: Jewels of Norman Weber

Perhaps Norman Weber - as a native of Schwabisch Gmund - was born with a love of jewellery. Following a traditional training as a gold and silversmith in Kaufbeuren-Neugablonz, where he teaches today at the State Vocational College for Glass and Jewellery, he studied with professors Hermann Junger, Otto Kunzli and Horst Sauerbruch at the Academy of Fine Arts in Munich. Here the then 25-year-old began his search, together with his colleagues Karl Fritsch, Peter Bauhuis and Karen Pontoppidan, for new paths and definitions in contemporary jewellery. Today Norman Weber is the storyteller in the contemporary studio jewellery scene. For example with the brooches from his series Portraits , which investigates cliches such as Barbie dolls. Focusing on a particular area of interest - popular images, comics and populist icons - the artist enmeshes the images in perfectly executed constructions - Weber is after all a goldsmith through and through - thereby giving them a new home. At times the critical jewellery artist places these figures in a completely new context. In this way jewellery is moved in the direction of pop and takes on the character of shrill fashion emblems. Precious stones made of velour in jewellery conjure up a smile on the lips of a viewer before he even begins to reflect on the meaning of the spurious stones. But Norman Weber not only tells stories. Other pieces are shaped by underlying constructivist elements - convincing jewellery because their mechanical elements are infused with an exciting dynamic. This monograph provides a first survey of the oeuvre of this talented jewellery master. Exhibition in the Deutsches Goldschmiedehaus Hanau from 2nd September 2010 and further venues thereafter, in Munich and Schwabisch Gmund.