New Collection
The Scottish Gallery welcomes a new collection from award winning jeweller Dorothy Hogg MBE.
Dorothy Hogg studied at Glasgow School of Art and the Royal College of Art and was course leader of Jewellery & Silversmithing at Edinburgh College of Art from 1985 until 2007. In 2001 she was awarded an MBE for services to jewellery and silversmithing and in 2005 she won the Brilliantly Brimingham Jewellery Award which is awarded to the jeweller who has made the greatest contribution to the world of designer-maker jewellery.
Her new collection features rings in a variety of metals including silver, platinum, palladium and gold, as well as mokume gane. Mokume gane (translated as wood grain metal) is a Japanese technique of layering sheets of different colours of metal and joining them together. The combined sheets are rolled down and punches are hammered on the back to raise some areas. Then the front of the sheet metal is filed flat revealing the layers of different coloured metals. To create her sculptural rings, Dorothy carves and files the shape from rough blocks until the requisite form is achieved. Then on the relevant parts another precious metal is applied to accentuate part of the form.
Dorothy Hogg, 2019I have been thinking for a while about developing a group of strong sculptural ring forms which include subtle and unexpected details.
Silver is a lovely material for these forms as it has a high reflective index and a warmth particular to silver.
In this group I concentrated on volume and reflectivity with gold and mokume gane emphasis in certain areas. Old Norse names seemed appropriate for some of the ideas for example HÂR means ‘little shark’ and Vingla means ‘to confuse’.
One of Dorothy‘s most popular designs is the simple Cube Ring – these are made of a precious metal wire which is firstly drawn through an oval shaped draw plate to achieve a shape which catches the light in a different way from a simple round wire. Then it is carefully cut into lengths and filed to fit at each corner. Although these rings look as though they will be uncomfortable they are actually very easy to wear – the interesting thing is that our fingers are not round but are actually almost flat on three sides, meaning the Cube Rings sit very comfortably.
View Dorothy Hogg’s collection here.
Recently I made a pair of square gold wedding rings for a young couple and received a lovely card thanking me for the rings and saying ‘we love that they are not round because life has angles’.
