I’ve been meaning to feature the work of Irish silversmith Noleen Logue designs for a few weeks now. Having graduated from NCAD this year, she was just awarded The New Designers Goldsmiths’ Company Award for Silversmithing and ‘Design in Silver’ from the Contemporary British Silversmiths.
Her work is centred around the expression ‘it’s what’s inside that counts’ and features a series of hand raised bowls. The bowls which are made of nickel silver and gilding metal are double walled and have sections cut out. I love her use of materials, she really uses the nickel silver and gilding metal to great effect, contrasting the lovely warm tones beautifully.
I also love the way she uses her skills to really illustrate the concept of the work. The work deals with the idea of what lies beneath the surface which is captured perfectly by these vessels with sections removed. The little piece which has been cut out provides us with as much information as the bowl itself. The little touches of using techniques like mokume gane to hint at the make up of the bowl, the inner surface.
She makes these double walled vessels and then carefully extracts a section. From the missing section we get a sneak peek into the inner wall of the bowl, this section is embellished with not only mokumé gane and but also with hand made sections of spots and strips, incorporating other metals like brass and copper.
