The Red and Black

Issue date: 8/21/08 Section: Out & About

Media Credit: Courtesy GMOA Kate Bauman's sterling silver creation, "Till Death Do Us Part," is one of the many rings on display at the Georgia Museum of Art's "The Ring Shows." [Click to enlarge]

Silver and gold may be used to make jewelry, but so can ordinary objects such as paper.

"The Ring Shows: Then & Now and Putting the Band Back Together" opens Saturday at the Georgia Museum of Art and features an array of unique rings.

The nearly 200 bands, on display by more than 130 artists, combine the present and past with some rings dating back to the 1970s.

"The idea was to bring [the show] back here because it began here - it's a piece of history for UGA and Lamar Dodd," said Jenny Collard, media relations coordinator for the museum.

In 1977, Gary Noffke, who worked in the jewelry and metalwork department at the University (now in the Lamar Dodd School of Art), began the first of three national ring shows.


Each ring became the property of Phi Beata Heata, a student organization for jewelry and metalwork.

The current ring show was created to commemorate the 30th anniversary of the first show. The exhibit also marks the first time "Then & Now" and "Putting the Band Back Together" will be presented together at the museum.

"The concepts of the designs are fresh and outside the box, it's something nontraditional," Collard said.

James Thurman, one of the artists featured in the exhibit, will showcase a ring made of sterling silver lining and bulks of layered paper.

"Everyone knows what a ring is, but it's like having a sculpture on your finger," Thurman said.

Thurman spends between 12 hours to an entire day gluing hundreds of paper pieces together before cutting the pieces to make jewelry.

His interest in recycling and discovering objects inspires his jewelry. He often chooses paper that has meaning, such as maps.

"With maps, you start to think of travel and it gets people thinking about traveling and layers of their experience," Thurman said.

For Thurman, the secret to creating unique pieces of jewelry is having fun.

"It's important to keep an element of play in everything you do," Thurman said. "Some of the new, exciting innovations come from just enjoying the process."

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