Whilst uprooting might inspire dread in some, jewellery designer Djurdjica Kesic adopts a rather different approach.

With a degree in Interior Design from RMIT, the Melbourne-based lecturer turned her hand to jewellery making when she was  overcome by a “need to make”.

Currently showing at Sydney’s Metalab, Kesic latest exhibition ‘Nomad’ – previously presented in Melbourne – finds an unusual source of inspiration for her sculptural collection of necklaces.

As the title suggests, her collection of work approaches the subject of migration, exploring the concept of portable homes and the setting up of domestic life elsewhere.

Herself a migrant from former Yugoslavia, Kesic’s collection of necklaces is a study of the objects that we carry with us, which she thoughtfully transforms them inert domestic items into transportable, mobile pendants. 

In the case of the objects in question, a battered jewellery box, a once loved lamp and an embroidered pillowcase are the household staples she offers a new life in a new context.

“I am nomadic so I don’t mind shedding things as I go,” says Kesic, who tirelessly braided the threads of an old family pillowcase to create an elegant layered necklace weaved in white.

A chair leg provides the inspiration for another piece, in which Kesic discovered “the preciousness” in celebrating the faults in the wood, then incorporating gold leaf into the hollow rounds.

‘Nomad’ is showing at Metalab from 4 March until 25 March 2010.

Metalab
metalab.com.au