For the sake of Opulence...

I am flattered to have recently been asked by The Opulent Project to participate in one of their ongoing projects, COSTUME COSTUME. As a result, I've been working on making lots of the Pro Nailz pieces the past couple of weeks. As you can tell from the image to the right, I've logged many hours painting nails while watching hours of terrible movies. I can barely tell the difference between my living room and a professional nail salon at this point.

The exhibition that I've been making the work for, COSTUME COSTUME, investigates the nature and subject of costume jewelry... Costume jewelry has been traditionally viewed as a mass produced, low price point, fashionable yet disposable variety of jewelry. According to The Opulent Project, 'the original intention of costume jewelry is not to become collectibles or heirlooms but to be fashionable and dispensable when the trend passes. Frequently this jewelry is a mimicry of existing unattainable luxury jewelry or simply of a notion of traditional jewelry.'

The goal of COSTUME COSTUME is to present the limited edition works of designers who have tweaked the identity of costume jewelry to address the conceptual issues associated with this genre of jewelry. The pieces that are represented in this show challenge concepts of value, material, historicism, and identity. 'By replication and alteration we seek to further remove the simulated jewelry from its origin, thus costuming the costumed.... COSTUME COSTUME.'

I shipped the work that I'm contributing to COSTUME COSTUME out this morning to the ladies of The Opulent Project. It all fit into a small sized USPS priority rate box, which is always nice because the shipping rates are tolerable but also discouraging because it seems like so much artwork and labor should take up more physical space.

Check it out: COSTUME COSTUME will be exhibited with Sienna Gallery at SOFA NY in April 2011, and will then travel to the Heidi Lowe Gallery in August.