Shining DESPAIR
Laurel Fulton
USA

Brooch “Variable function 1”
Silver, steel and acrylic, 40x75x10mm
Cast and fabricated

Brooch “Variable Function 2”
Silver, steel and acrylic, 80x40x10mm
Cast and fabricated

We experience the world in the only way we can, through and with our bodies. We receive and disseminate information with our bodies and then interpret it to create our ideas of the world. Each of us function differently and therefore our interpretations of our experiences vary greatly. These variances in our understanding of the world create tension, miscommunication and suffering. Human beings have difficulty stepping outside of one’s own body and seeing things through another’s eyes.

These brooches visually refer to what appear to be functioning systems or bodies. Funnels receiving input, tubes and pipes relaying one thing to another and receptacles containing some unnoted substance. Yet these small systems do not function but instead are small portraits of dysfunction and untenable parts referencing our inability to truly understand one another.

Although there is despair in our misunderstanding of one another there is also the beauty in the differences between us. Without this difference, without variation there is sameness and replication. Both of which do not allow for diversity of thought, expression of nonconformity. We all function differently.

More « Shining DESPAIR »

Shining Despair – Holland Houdek / USA

Words fail in the face of miscarriage.

Shining Despair – Eiko Nakahara / Japan

In the current state of the world, people hate each other and there are countries full of hatred.

Shining Despair – Carmen Lopez / Spain

Spinning reflections on the title of the competition.

Shining Despair – Kamile Staneliene / Lithuania

The brooch “Shining Despair” reflects the contrast between life’s darkness and the light that endures within it.

Shining Despair – Denis Music / Ukraine

The idea of the « Attention » brooch emerged during the challenging days of 2023.

Shining Despair – Arisa Inoue / Japan

It’s not uncommon for darkness to cast a shadow over the human heart.

Shining Despair – Anna Talbot / Norway

The series ‘Pressed Flowers’ is inspired by my memories of my grandfather’s garden from my childhood.

Shining Despair – Pilar Viedma / Spain

As every year, at the beginning of autumn, the Mediterranean people know that one day the floodgates of heaven will open …

Shining Despair – Malene Kastalje / Denmark

I am preoccupied with the unpredictable and abnormal aspects of life.

Shining Despair – Uri Samet / Israel

From circumstances defined mostly by despair, anguish and darkness – small fragments of light emit.