FRAGILITY
Cindy Zhaohan-Li
United Kingdom

Growth Ribbon reflects on fragility as a generative state, where pain, transformation, and renewal coexist in the human body. I programmed the Tibetan Auspicious Ribbon Patterns into digital algorithms, transforming their intertwining gestures into generative forms that link the virtual and the tactile, the crafted and the personal. By inputting a single body scar as a growth line, each piece evolves into an auspicious jewellery form. The code translates stretch marks, growth lines, and traces of maternity into ornaments of grace, each a mark of fragility and renewal. Designed to echo the skin’s flexibility, every piece can be folded and expanded when worn, mirroring how scars often appear near joints where the body bends and heals. Inspired by my mother’s postpartum marks and my own adolescent growth lines, painful yet vital, these wearable forms embody emotional elasticity, tracing the balance between tenderness and endurance. Growth Ribbon celebrates fragility not as weakness, but as the quiet strength of healing and life’s persistence.

Brooch « Growth Ribbon Brooch », 2022
218x150x30 mm / gr
Sterling Silver
Algorithmic design, 3D wax print, lost-wax cast, metal riveting, soldering, polishing

Necklace « Growth Ribbon Necklace », 2022
200x174x18 mm / gr
Sterling Silver
Algorithmic design, 3D wax print, lost-wax cast, metal riveting, soldering, oxidation finish

More « FRAGILITY »

Fragility – Ute van der Plaats / Belgium

FRAGILITYUte van der PlaatsBelgiumMy mother was born as a Berglanddeutsche, a German-speaking minority living in the Banat, a region that belongs to Romania since the end of the First World War. In 1944 the family fled from the Russian invasion to Germany. I never got...

Fragility – Keith Lewis – USA

FRAGILITYKeith LewisUnited StatesThe Saddest Aisle Consider the Saddest Aisle, that mass of forlorn, abandoned baskets huddled together at the thrift store. In their puppy-eyed, earnest yearning they exude an almost hilarious melancholy. And they long for a new home....

Fragility – Brenda Schweder / USA

FRAGILITYBrenda SchwederUnited StatesPeople tip-toe around fragility like it’s a brittle, frail state of weakness that seeps from the outer skin of a thing and travels through and through to the core. But they don’t stop to look beneath the outer edges to what lie...

Fragility – Joshua Kosker / USA

FRAGILITYJoshua KoskerUnited States This brooch is an exploration of time, place, and the residue of human existence. One of its components—a fragment of tile found in the ruins of Pompeii—speaks to the fragility of ancient civilizations and the lasting imprint of...

Fragility – Alicia Salcedo / Spain

FRAGILITYAlicia SalcedoSpainProtecting ourselves, seeking refuge, the shell as armor, as protection, as home.The shell that once sheltered its own life now collects a foreign element. A being that occupies an empty space previously inhabited. But it also wears away,...

Fragility – Lily Preve / Greece

FRAGILITYLily PreveGreece "… If this moment were innocent, time an angel, and the act fateful, I would have nothing more to confess than the silent harshness of words. In time, you do not choose the form of things; it is enough to feel its silent fragility and to...

Fragility – Esteban Erosky / Spain

FRAGILITYEsteban EroskySpainWhen our weaknesses, traumas, flaws, or idiosyncrasies are exposed, we become fragile. We go from feeling secure to feeling insecure, to being vulnerable. Always showing ourselves makes us feel insecure, which is why in my pieces I address...

Fragility – Yael Ouliel / Israel

FRAGILITYYael OulielIsraelThe union of rusted iron and 18-karat gold reveals fragility as a fundamental dimension of matter and existence. The iron, slowly eroded by rust, bears witness to vulnerability and transience, while the gold remains intact, its value unveiled...

Fragility – Carmen Lopez / Spain

FRAGILITYCarmen LopezSpainMy weak point is the spoon, my creative vulnerability. Sometimes I want to escape it, but it assaults my mind, invades my notebooks, my house: metal, wood, enamel, glass. With its docility, it doesn't force me to do anything—I am just an...

Fragility – Denis Music / Ukraine

FRAGILITYDenis MusicUkraineFragility is a state of tension — between strength and collapse, between freedom and threat, between life and its disappearance. My brooch Black Cloud was inspired by the installation of Ukrainian artist Oleksiy Sai, which rose above the...