HANNA HEDMAN

Copper, Paint, and Synthetic Fiber Necklace
from Enough Tears to Cry for Two Collection

Skåne, Sweden could easily be called the castle capital of the world, as it is the location to over three hundred.

Some fortresses, such as the Drottningholm Palace and Kina Slott, are World Heritage sites while many consider Trolleholm Castle akin to the citadels of fairy tales. Sweden is also home to featured jewelry designer Hanna Hedman.

Hedman is clearly not bound to trends or conventional ideas. Her contemporary art jewelry designs come from an uncompromising mind that courageously reaches beyond the concepts normally associated with jewelry.

In another post, I touched on the subject of jewelry's ability to evoke emotion from an observer, and viewing Hedman's unusual pieces did just that.

In all frankness, her jewelry is scary and bizarre in its non-descript irregularities. A distinct, nightmarish quality evokes the grotesque imagery of some of Tim Burton's films.

Due to the muted gray and dusty brown color of the metals, there is starkness, a sense of loss, emptiness, and sadness. At the same time, the arrangement of the materials--a mesh of copper, sterling silver, and oxidized silver--is oddly beautiful.

Hedman approaches her jewelry collections with the theme of humanity's dark, frail emotions that lead to escapism, lying, and various defense mechanisms.

Her collection of necklaces entitled What You Tell is not Always What You Have Experienced explores the murky human tendency to change or omit information when telling a story.

"The sad and disgusting can also be something beautiful," she explains. "Beauty might be seen as vain, but I find it interesting to contrast beauty with the not so nice, and the unpleasant."

Hedman's educational base is layered with knowledge acquired from the United States' Western State College in Colorado, Sweden's Ädellab, and New Zealand's Otago Polytechnic. She has also studied under the tutelage of Dutch designer Iris Eichenberg, and Denmark native Kim Buck.

Oxidized Silver, Copper, Powder Coat
and Paint Necklace from
 What You Tell is not Always What You Experienced Collection

Hedman creates an emotionally charged aesthetic by the seemingly simplistic use of shape, texture, and color.

The jewelry is a wildly provocative interpretation of the equally enigmatic human psyche with items that appear weighty, cumbersome, prickly, uncomfortable, and chaotic.

Hedman was recently awarded Austria's So Fresh Award, and ongoing exhibitions of her work take place in Poland, Holland, Germany, Sweden, Finland, and the United States.

To view more of Hedman's fantastical jewelry, go to Klimt02.net .