A look at the luxe designs of five exhibitors at the May art show.
TEFAF New York is far from the largest show on the art fair calendar, but you wouldn’t know that from the crowds that flocked to the event’s May 11 invitation-only preview at the Park Avenue Armory.
Contemporary jewelers and dealers brought exceptional pieces to the show, which was open to the general public from May 12 to 16. Hosted by The European Fine Art Foundation (TEFAF) — a nonprofit that focuses on fine arts, antiques and design — the New York event is a companion to The Netherlands’ TEFAF Maastricht fair.
Out of the 91 exhibitors at the show, only three contemporary artists and two galleries specialized in high jewelry. This small but prestigious group brought several pieces exclusively for the New York fair.
Boghossian
The Park Avenue Armory, which sits on Manhattan’s Upper East Side, was constructed for military use in the 19th century. One of its distinctive features is a series of interior rooms furnished with ornamental woodwork, marble and stained glass, and these served as private exhibition spaces for this year’s fair. Boghossian occupied one such room on the second floor, redesigning it to represent the family-owned firm’s heritage.
The Geneva-based jewelry brand began as gem traders on the Silk Road. Today, fifth- and sixth-generation family members manage the company, which specializes in acquiring exceptional gemstones through its generations of contacts, and placing them in mountings that use as little metal as possible. The resulting jewels play with light at all angles in a pure presentation of artistry and craft.
The piece that made the greatest impression at TEFAF was an 18-karat white gold necklace featuring an array of fancy-pink and white diamonds, including a fancy-intense-purplish-pink cushion and an 11.72-carat marquise. The latter is a spectacular D-color, internally flawless, type IIa diamond that puts the finishing touch on what is already an exceptional necklace.
There were many other creations that commanded attention as well, including an 11.87-carat, no-oil emerald in an angular, geometric ring of 18-karat yellow and white gold. The ring’s shank features two taper-cut diamonds as well as diamond pavé.
Hemmerle
A floor below Boghossian, in another of the private rooms, was German high jeweler Hemmerle. The Munich-based brand is a mainstay at TEFAF Maastricht and New York, and this year’s offerings included the exclusive unveiling of a bracelet that suspended a marquise-shaped, 40-carat diamond between two twists of iron rope. The company often uses metals such as iron, bronze and aluminum to create its pieces. Also on show was a pair of sculpted bronze earrings in a spiral design with white gold on the reverse side, featuring 100 rare diamond cabochons that totaled 29 carats.
Didier Ltd.
At the end of the main hallway was London-based gallery Didier Ltd. Its specialty is jewels by modern artists, which it acquires from the secondary art market. There is no one more knowledgeable in this niche than gallery owners Didier and Martine Haspeslagh. Among the items on display were a gold brooch of Venus and Cupid by Italian painter Afro Basaldella, and a piece by Italian artist Francesco Pavan in the shape of a flattened cube.
Otto Jakob
On the main showroom floor, longtime TEFAF Maastricht exhibitor Otto Jakob was exhibiting in New York for the first time. The self-taught German goldsmith brought his collection of intricately crafted works, which incorporate ancient goldsmithing and enameling techniques as well as more advanced methods like 3D printing.
One of the pieces he brought with him was the Camelot ring, which centers a blue-green tourmaline. Four arched prongs of white and yellow gold form a bezel for the stone, and the hoop consists of darkly oxidized white gold accentuated with painted gold. Then there’s the yellow gold Trilobit bracelet, which takes its inspiration from fossilized trilobites — the arthropods that populated the world’s oceans before going extinct 250 million years ago. Precise ball-and-socket joints connect the articulated links, “giving a naturalistic grace” to the opening and closing of the bracelet, Jakob said.
FD Gallery
This New York gallery specializes in 20th-century and contemporary jewels from around the world, representing historic brands, modern-day jewelry artists and rare unsigned pieces. Owner Fiona Druckenmiller has a special partnership with Paris-based jeweler Alessandro Sabbatini, who founded the Sabba high-jewelry brand. FD Gallery is the exclusive dealer for his jewels, and several of his signature chandelier and drop earrings were on display among the other vintage and period pieces.
Main image: Hemmerle earrings. (Hemmerle)
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