Contemporary jewellery artefact interpreting the stripe motif acting metonymically in sources of western art

This practice-based research works through contemporary jewellery as its mode of practice. It investigates new contemporary jewellery by examining the stripe motif as a metonym occurring in selected paintings from fourteenth to fifteenth century Italy and the Netherlands, and interpreting the source material in new ways. The specific selection of the motif is the stripe acting as a metonym. The research investigates the potential of the stripe motif to speak of a specific condition, or attribute, or characteristic or occurrence in the source material. It enquires into how these occurrences in the selected sources can be translated into another material form, which is the jewellery object. This translation involves an interpretive process.<br><br>The use of the stripe motif as a metonym affecting the cultural context of the composition implies a system of signification. The stripe motif may be identified as a mark selected by the painter to draw attention to a compositional area in the painting. As an iconographic occurrence the stripe has the potential to convey a particular meaning or embodiment of an idea as a fulcrum for that painting. Thus the stripe embodies different purposes within the image. In its iconographic characteristics lies its metonymic purpose for an iconological implication. This informs the practice-led research of jewellery making through an interpretive and translational process.