Curated by Jo bloxham and Benjamin Lignel. Twenty-nine artists from fourteen countries have accepted our invitation to study - and creatively respond to - the life of Suzy Solidor. A singer, model, writer and actress, Suzy Solidor (1900 – 1983) was an intensely iconic figure of the Parisian night-life during the roaring twenties: she owned a nightclub in Paris, where she used to woo her audience with a staple of sailor songs in homage to Surcouf, the corsair of St Malo she claimed as her ancestor, or chronicle the love affairs of men and women. A self-avowed sexual predator, she openly dated both, and became somewhat of a de facto advocate of sexual freedom. Popular with German troops during the Second World War, her first club - la Vie Parisienne - was closed shortly after the libération, and Solidor forbidden to run an establishment for 5 years. She opened her next club in 1949, and moved to the French Riviera in 1960, where she stayed until her death. 

Dail Behennah, Michael Brennand-Wood, Stephen Bottomley, Ken Bova, Melissa Cameron, Jim Cotter, Susan Cross, Robert Ebendorf, Beate Gegenwart, Caroline Gore, Jane Harrison, Gretchen Goss, Arthur Hash, Thomas Hill, Timothy Information Limited, Basil Kardasis, Felix Lindner, Megan McGaffigan, Trish O'Hara , Matthew Partington, Maria Phillips, Marissa Saneholtz, Marlene True, Elizabeth Turrell, Jessica Turrell

Participating artists: Agelio Batle, USA • Garry Knox Bennett, USA • Daniel DiCaprio, USA • Thomas Gentille, USA • Katy Hackney, UK • Julia Harrison, USA • Sachiyo Higaki, Japan • Tom Hill, UK/USA • Leonor Hipólito, Portugal • Deukhee Ka, Korea • Kenta Katakura, Japan • Djurdjica Kesic, Yugoslavia/Australia • Beppe Kessler, Netherlands • Edgar Mosa, USA • Nick Mullins, USA • Jacob Nyberg, Sweden • Gitte Nygaard, Denmark • Lina Peterson, UK • Auba Pont, Spain • Fliss Quick, UK • Gustav Reyes, USA • Catherine Truman, Australia • Julia Turner USA • Flóra Vági, Hungary • Manuel Vilhena, Portugal • Luzia Vogt, Switzerland

Since earliest times and in all cultures man has made functional, decorative and devotional objects depicting animals.

From the humblest terra-cotta egg cup in the form of a chick to the most opulent Baroque boar's head serving dishes, from a child's wooden toy to sacred statues of Anubis.

I aimed to create a group of functional objects that would maintain a sense of sculptural vitality and movement. The pieces are assembled from redwood or basswood: carved, painted then polished with a hard paste wax finish.

I enjoy the contrast between inside and out. The hinged green head opens to reveal a brilliant red interior, the harlequin owl glows egg-yolk yellow inside.

Eyes look up at you from the table, a lively interaction between user and object.

For this series, I have worked with textiles to capture color and movement in object form. Through an iterative process of dyeing, sewing, painting, stitching, and dipping simple fabrics are transformed into ephemeral yet wearable skyscapes of hue and shade. Mia Maljojoki, 2012

"Since I have begun to make jewelry as an art form people frequently ask what are my signature works. Signature defines a creative person's identity. When originality is applied to art it expresses a personal visual statement."

Studio jeweler Margaret De Patta blended Constructivist principles with Bauhaus design to create miniature sculpture that moved with its wearer. Based in the Bay Area, De Patta, who studied with Bauahus sculptor Moholy-Nagy in Chicago is credited with starting the American studio jewelry movement on the West Coast. The Oakland Museum holds the largest collection of De Patta's work, most of which was donated by her husband Eugene Bielawski after the artist's untimely death in 1964. De Patta and experimental lapidary artist Francis J. Sperisen explored the optical effects of faceting and lenses on gemstones to create wearable sculpture unlike any jewelry of the time.

In her first solo exhibition, Amy Tavern will recreate jewelry from her grandmother's jewelry box, as she remembers it. Using a variety of materials to interpret and remember as many pieces as possible, she will revisit some of the pieces that shaped her personal history and relationship with jewelry. This exhibition will be the culmination of Amy Tavern's three-year residency at Penland School of Crafts in the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina

See jewelry and metalwork by New York artist, Lola Brooks, and Seattle-based artist, Andy Cooperman, in this special exhibition. Lola and Andy are both presenters in the Forging Communities Symposium, organized by the Metal Arts Guild in celebration of their 60th anniversary.

"I have created a series of pieces that is about preciousness. The materials that I have chosen to incorporate into the work are precious: diamonds, petroleum and panned gold. Each substance is appealing in its own way. The diamond slices are organic in shape and flawed with inclusions and streaks of grey, black and yellow. The petroleum is dark amber, gritty and rich in color and consistency. The gold flakes are delicate -- floating in liquid like particles in a snow globe. These materials are from and embody the earth. They all share a precious existence. " Sandra Enterline, 2011

"I do believe that toys and jewelry are very similar. They are of a similar scale. This is my favorite scale. Even a little smaller is good. And since I don't wear jewelry very often, they are both objects to me. Toys and objects to populate a world: this is my goal and desire. But when women and men wear jewelry, they populate their world which is their body. To have an adornment on your form: this is why I love the apple trees in San Francisco. They have the most beautiful lichens. So what you do is this: you see an apple tree, you check if there are fruits or flowers. You can see this from a distance. Then, you have to get close. And there are beautiful orange lichens on the bark. And this is the tree's jewelry. This is what I like about people wearing jewelry, that you have to be close to a person to see what it is." Niki Ulehla, 2011

Orfeo Quagliata has been working with glass since he was 12 years old, when he began apprenticing with his father, acclaimed artist Narcissus Quagliata and his Grandmother, Herta Jalkotzy, an award-winning jewelry designer in the Wiener Werkstätte. He learned cold-working techniques at age 17 from Catalonian glass artist José Fernandez Castrillo. He later began experimenting with other techniques, such as lamp-wroking and fusing, after earning a BFA in Industrial and Furniture Design from the California College of Arts (CCA). For this exhibition Orfeo has worked in collaboration with Swarovski Elements crystal to produce his jewelry and unique cups of facetted borosilicate.

The exhibition is curated by Lauren Simeoni and Melinda Young. Ten participating artists constructed natural and organic forms from man-made material to create jewelry that is unnatural, naturally. unnatural Acts is an exhibition that began as a project among friends and has since traveled through Australia and New Zealand. Velvet da Vinci is the only US venue for this project.

Repasando la geografía española observamos que se impone la radición más conservadora y, en gran medida, prevalece la idea de que el valor de la joya recae principalmente en el valor del material con el que está hecha. Las nuevas joyas ya no son necesariamente de metales y piedras preciosas, sino que los artistas joyeros utilizan toda clase de técnicas y materiales como madera, plástico, esmaltes, porcelana, resinas, hueso, tejidos, viejos objetos, fotografías, etcétera para atraer la atención del espectador, otra característica que las distingue es el tamaño, lejos de estar sujetas a una regla, las medidas de estas joyas pueden causar sorpresa y así encontrarnos por ejemplo con enormes broches que funcionan como una escultura ya que buena parte del valor artístico de las piezas viene dado por el trabajo conceptual que encierra cada una de ellas.

"In April 2010 I was in Mexico City to attend a jewellery symposium called Walking the Gray Area. After a week of wonderfully inspiring talks and exhibitions, it was time to come home. I said my goodbyes and went back to my hotel to pack in readiness for my flight home the next morning. Then, I heard a news flash, which said the skies over Europe were closed due to a volcanic eruption in Iceland. This was too ridiculous to be true. I had to get home as I was travelling to Australia in two days' time. But, as the hours morphed into days it quickly became clear that I was going nowhere soon..." Jo Bloxham, 2011

Working in collaboration with well-known US and UK-based jewelers and metalsmiths, Host is part furniture installation and part intervention into the architecture of the gallery. Gates' woodworking employs traditional methods of furniture making, but also incorporates recycled and reclaimed materials such as broken chests and chairs. Appropriately, Velvet da Vinci is housed in a former furniture factory where for 60 years traditional Italian furniture was fabricated by the Daini Family.

I worry about the effects of global warming, man-made calamities, diminishing resources and species. I find myself wondering what the earth will look like for my son and grandchildren. It has made me consider the vital role nature plays in my enjoyment of life everyday. This series is called Traces. After years of making pieces that didn't involve the body, I chose to use the smaller scale and traditional materials of jewelry to evoke a sense of intimacy and preciousness; that seemed appropriate for reflection on pleasure and loss. I'm still involved with color, but there is some violence in it.

"I have trouble with concepts of Orderly and Disorderly. "Orderly" can seem demanding, claustrophobic, predictable. But it also can be classic, comforting, mind-clearing. With order, things can be laid to rest. "Disorderly" can be unnerving, confusing, time-consuming., but in disorder is an honest beauty, a randomness that makes perfect sense . A riot of disorder tells a story you may really want to hear." Brooke Battles

"The starting point for this work is my fascination with the inherent chaos and calm of the tides; both literally and methaphorically as in the tidal grind of city life. After exploring and documenting the tides and their extended effects I distilled my research into a graphic vocabulary of images and textures. This evolving narrative manifested itself in the form of hand engraved picture diaries and memory map brooches. The slow and deliberate process of hand engraving lends another dimension to the work. As there are no shortcuts while engraving, time is spent slowly watching a story come to life." Pierce Healy

"Installation art suggests something to me which is in many ways the opposite of my own practice as an artist-craftsman. The words bring to my mind images of chilly white rooms with forbidding collections of found objects recreated into confrontational and unemotional pieces, requiring text and/or context in order that the viewer can understand the complexities and layers of meaning contained within the piece: a complex intellectual statement that is about effect rather than affect, the brain not the heart. I wanted to create a piece that would above all create atmosphere. To bring together a series of craft objects (or perhaps, more appropriately, "crafted objects") which have an emotional reaction in the viewer, where the visual impact of the whole is greater than the sum of the parts. I want to make the viewer feel as if he has been transported away from the streets of San Francisco and into the pages of a richly illustrated children's book." Tom Hill

Participating artists: Shana Astrachan, Anastasia Azure, Ela Bauer, Lea Marie Becker, Iris Bodemer, Sofia Björkman, Sigurd Bronger, Burcu Büyükünal, Ana Margarida Carvalho, Peter Chang, Joe Churchman, Jens A. Clausen, Barbara Cohen, Lisa and Scott Cylinder, Peter Deckers, Coco Dunmire, Janine Eisenhauer, Beate Eismann, Ute Eitzenhofer, Diane Falkenhagen, Jantje Fleischhut, Javier Moreno Frias, Velina Glass, Robly A. Glover, Suzanne Golden, Rebecca Hannon, Tamara Grüner, Arthur Hash, Eero Hintsanen, Kath Inglis, Jiro Kamata, Masumi Kataoka, Sun Kyoung Kim, Sarah King, Susanne Klemm, Jocelyn Kolb, Katja Korsawe, Birgit Laken, Margaux Lange, Carla Pennie McBride, Edward Lane McCartney, Karen McCreary, Charlene Modena, Masako Onedera, Niala Orsmond, emiko oye, Mary Hallam Pearse, Ruudt Peters, Natalya Pinchuk, Katja Prins, Yuka Saito, Karin Seufert, Leslie Shershow, Susan Kasson Sloan, Anika Smulovitz, Lin Stanionis, Rebecca Strzelec, Donna Mason Sweigart, Anthony Tammaro, Billie Jean Theide, Carolyn Tillie, Cynthia Toops, Silke Trekel, Jacomijn van der Donk, Mona Wallstrom, Kathryn Wardill, Emily Watson, Karla Way, Josephine Winther, Sayumi Yokouchi, Sandra Zilker

"There it lies in all its inimitable freshness. New jewellery by Svenja John. The flat surface has been replaced by a focus on three-dimensional forms and shapes, plus sudden sounds. When you wear it, the jewellery softly rattles, gently clinks and chinks. And remarkably, even though the individual elements are now more fixed and immobile, the pieces as a whole seem more reactive, more mercurial, much more flexible." Gabi Dewald

Transpositions began with a discarded clarinet. Disassembled and repurposed, the deconstructed clarinet merged into a body of work that transformed a once aural implement into a visual one. Lisa and Scott Cylinder's Transpositions is the result of this exploration.

Fascinated by the molecular makeup of objects, Susie Ganch's work is made up of multiple interconnected units. Ganch uses traditional materials of silver, steel, and copper, and applies color to her work with sugar-fired enamel. Each interdependent element, or "molecule," vibrates with movement and "offers us the opportunity see and feel what we are made of."

Participating artists: Joani Bekker • Bea Cecile Bernard • Idane Burger • Kirsten Gerber • Marnell Kirsten • Jacomien Labuschagne • Eric Loubser • Lee Malan • Karin Rae Matthee • Marie-Louise De La Marque Naudé • Nanette Nel • Junior Ackeem Ngwenya • Johan van Aswegen • Gussie van der Merwe • Nini van der Merwe • Maeve Roseveare • Carine Terreblanche • Therese de Villiers • Erika Voigt • Anthi Voyatjes

Boris Bally transforms recycled street signs, weapon parts, and a wide variety of found materials into objects for reflection. He rivets and forms the hand-selected signs, which he purchases from cities. These pieces celebrate raw American street-aesthetic in the form of objects, often useful, for the home and the body.

Seth Papac's fascination with 17th century European parures, a matching jewelry set comprised of modular components, influences his current work. Papac's work transforms and disassembles from one piece into another; necklaces become bracelets and earrings, chatelaines contain removable necklaces and objects. His broad range of materials, from traditional metal and enamel to found objects, wood, string, and leather, become narrative works of wearable jewelry or objects.