SETTINGS & FINDINGS N.9 WITH OLAF TØNNESLAND HODNE
by matt lambert
The work of Oslo based artist Olaf Tønnesland Hodne directly questions the function of jewelry and its uses. The work made of stone at times is plausible to wear while other times monolithically manifests as a heavy burden requiring the imagination to think of what heavily reinforced garment would be needed to wear a 2kg brooch and where it should be located to not fatigue one's body through the day. The practicality in Olaf’s work is its clear questioning of function and use. Stone takes center and back stage confronting the viewer with shield-like forms while being maximally used to create the mechanisms that form the pin back.
"For me a setting is such an expressive way for us humans to hold on to, exhibit, and show our thoughts and feelings through material expression. As I work alot with alternative settings I find it tickles my brain when I turn up the size of the stone I'm setting, going from a small gem to two kilogram quartz. It gives me a moment of relief, that it isn't all about us humans, it's not our human size that is the standard of jewellery. I'll make brooches for trees and cows. they probably don't care, but ill make it for them.
In Findings, I think I use my collection of rocks, minerals and crystals to explore and understand what this universe is made out of. Working with stone really helps to ground me when I dissociate. These inorganic matters are lifeless. There is a serenity in them knowing they grow out of the laws of the universe, not from life or human hands, as so much of our objects and materials are around us. And if the stones have any power, it sure as hell is not for us and our romanticized worldview. They are too secretive.
I use stone as my main material and jewellery as my medium at the moment. I think the subject I'm in now is something I will continue for a while, as I don't feel finished with it yet. I try to lock some of my brooches and jewellery in a series or an exhibition, but I still continue after that with the concept.
I carve stone to the shape of a shield or a simplified one. I do this to put the colours and shapes of the stone in a visual language about identity and history as heraldry. Using this format to go back to pondering how the stone was made. Why, how and when did the endless soup of moving rocks end up like that? My focus lies in the geological processes that the stone has undergone and of which each individual rock type shows evidence. The minerals and crystals reveal a geological history of the stone's identity.
I am quite insistent in my expression of form with the shield and oblong shape. This has become a way of putting the minerals in the same position so that it is the character of the stone that comes out and is read. I therefore grind functional jewellery elements into the stone itself, only adding a brooch needle as extra material. This makes the stone functional without adding other materials and parts. Although the works become able jewellery, I often work with varying sizes so that it ranges from being a small pin on a shirt to a brooch weighing over 2 kg. The imaginary brooch now takes a bigger part in how one imagines the piece of jewellery on the body, due to its weight which makes it unusable as a physical piece of jewellery. Then again, does it lose its jewellery context because of size, weight and usability?"
Olaf Tønnesland Hodne
/olafhodne.no/
The work of Oslo based artist Olaf Tønnesland Hodne directly questions the function of jewelry and its uses. The work made of stone at times is plausible to wear while other times monolithically manifests as a heavy burden requiring the imagination to think of what heavily reinforced garment would be needed to wear a 2kg brooch and where it should be located to not fatigue one's body through the day. The practicality in Olaf’s work is its clear questioning of function and use. Stone takes center and back stage confronting the viewer with shield-like forms while being maximally used to create the mechanisms that form the pin back.
- ml
"For me a setting is such an expressive way for us humans to hold on to, exhibit, and show our thoughts and feelings through material expression. As I work alot with alternative settings I find it tickles my brain when I turn up the size of the stone I'm setting, going from a small gem to two kilogram quartz. It gives me a moment of relief, that it isn't all about us humans, it's not our human size that is the standard of jewellery. I'll make brooches for trees and cows. they probably don't care, but ill make it for them.
In Findings, I think I use my collection of rocks, minerals and crystals to explore and understand what this universe is made out of. Working with stone really helps to ground me when I dissociate. These inorganic matters are lifeless. There is a serenity in them knowing they grow out of the laws of the universe, not from life or human hands, as so much of our objects and materials are around us. And if the stones have any power, it sure as hell is not for us and our romanticized worldview. They are too secretive.
I use stone as my main material and jewellery as my medium at the moment. I think the subject I'm in now is something I will continue for a while, as I don't feel finished with it yet. I try to lock some of my brooches and jewellery in a series or an exhibition, but I still continue after that with the concept.
I carve stone to the shape of a shield or a simplified one. I do this to put the colours and shapes of the stone in a visual language about identity and history as heraldry. Using this format to go back to pondering how the stone was made. Why, how and when did the endless soup of moving rocks end up like that? My focus lies in the geological processes that the stone has undergone and of which each individual rock type shows evidence. The minerals and crystals reveal a geological history of the stone's identity.
I am quite insistent in my expression of form with the shield and oblong shape. This has become a way of putting the minerals in the same position so that it is the character of the stone that comes out and is read. I therefore grind functional jewellery elements into the stone itself, only adding a brooch needle as extra material. This makes the stone functional without adding other materials and parts. Although the works become able jewellery, I often work with varying sizes so that it ranges from being a small pin on a shirt to a brooch weighing over 2 kg. The imaginary brooch now takes a bigger part in how one imagines the piece of jewellery on the body, due to its weight which makes it unusable as a physical piece of jewellery. Then again, does it lose its jewellery context because of size, weight and usability?"
Olaf Tønnesland Hodne
/olafhodne.no/
Pictures List & Credits
Picture list:
- Graphic Granite Shield, backside view, 2021, Grapic granite, brass, steel
Photo: by artist - Amethyst Window, 2020, synthetic amethyst, copper, steel
Photo: by artist - Nephrite Shield, 2019, nephrite, silver, steel
Photo: by artist - Obsidian Shield, 2019, Obsidian, silver, steel
Photo: by artist - Labradorite Shield, 2019, labradorite, steel
Photo: by artist - Huge Quartz Window, 2021, Synthetic quartz, brass, steel
Photo: by artist - Tigers Eye Shield on Chrysocolla podium, 2021, tigers eye, brass, steel, chrysocolla
Photo: by artist - Sapphire Window on Rose Quartz Podium, 2021, Synthetic sapphire, silver, steel, rose quartz
Photo: by artist - Installation view for Colours in the dark, part 2, at Kunstbanken i Hedmark, Hamar
Photo: Øystein Thorvaldsen - Installation view for Colours in the dark, part 2, at Kunstbanken i Hedmark, Hamar
Photo: Øystein Thorvaldsen - Installation view for Colours in the dark, part 2, at Kunstbanken i Hedmark, Hamar
Photo: Øystein Thorvaldsen - Installation view for Colours in the dark, part 2, at Kunstbanken i Hedmark, Hamar
Photo: Øystein Thorvaldsen - Installation view for Colours in the dark, part 1, at Format, Oslo, 2021
Photo: Thomas Tveter - Installation view for Colours in the dark, part 1, at Format, Oslo, 2021
Photo: Thomas Tveter - Installation view for Colours in the dark, part 1, at Format, Oslo, 2021
Photo: Thomas Tveter - Installation view for Colours in the dark, part 1, at Format, Oslo, 2021
Photo: Thomas Tveter - Installation view for Colours in the dark, part 1, at Format, Oslo, 2021
Photo: Thomas Tveter - Installation view for Colours in the dark, part 1, at Format, Oslo, 2021
Photo: Thomas Tveter - Portrait
Photo: Kristoffer Kråkstad
