“In comparison to sculpture, making jewelry is a very delicate process,” explains Claude Lalanne, the revered French artist who began making bijoux to give to friends as gifts more than 50 years ago. “I get the greatest sense of achievement in being able to swap between the two, and navigate their differences.” Above, the 92-year-old talks T through her artistic processes, and explains the personal significance of the burnished copper cabinet that holds her own butterfly jewel creations. “Neither a jewelry box nor a display cabinet, but a bit of both, I think of this as a mini art piece,” she says. “It’s the one and only piece I have ever made to house jewelry. It keeps the jewels safe, whilst at the same time showing them off.” Normally positioned on the dressing table of her home outside Fontainebleau in northern France — “I believe jewelry should be seen, not stored away out of sight” — it will be on view for the first time this week alongside more than 50 small sculptures and jewels at the Louisa Guinness gallery in London. The display comes ahead of a presentation of the artist’s large-scale sculpture by Guinness’s husband, the gallerist Ben Brown, later this year.
Credit: Luke Andrew Walker
