Goldsmith's Workshop, AD 1576

Etienne Delaune, Goldsmith's Workshop, an engraving showing the interior of a goldsmith's workshop in France, AD 1576

This pair of signed and dated engravings by Delaune (1519-1583) document the practice of sixteenth-century goldsmithing. The walls of the workshop are lined with the tools of the craft: pliers, files, drills, gravers, and hammers. The boy turning the winch on the left appears to be drawing wire. The worktable is placed perpendicular to the large window, in order to provide maximum natural light to the craftsmen. On the right a youth holds a pair of tongs in a small forge, with a bellows and an anvil by his side. Each workman sits with a leather apron tucked into his belt and attached to the table to catch filings of precious metal.

The second print shows the older man with spectacles serving a client through the window. He is possibly a self-portrait by Delaune. A display of chains and pendants hangs from the ceiling in full view of the street but out of reach of passers-by.

Delaune is recorded working as a goldsmith in Paris in 1546 and briefly in the royal mint six years later. His first dated prints were made when he was 42 years old. As a Calvinist, he left Paris at the time of the St Bartholomew's Eve massacre in 1572, and moved first to Strasbourg and later, according to the inscription on this print, to Augsburg.

Medieval Craftsman: Goldsmiths

"The goldsmith should have a furnace with a hole at the top so that the smoke can get out. One hand should govern the bellows with light pressure and with the greatest care so that the air pressed through the nozzle may blow upon the coals and feed the fire. Let him have an anvil of extreme hardness on which the iron or gold may be laid and softened and may take the required form. They can be stretched and pulled with the tongs and the hammer. There should also be a hammer for making gold leaf, as well as sheets of silver, tin, brass, iron, or copper. The goldsmith must have a very sharp chisel with which he can engrave figures of many kinds on amber, hard stone, marble, emerald, sapphire or pearl. He should have a touchstone for testing, and one for distinguishing steel from iron. He must also have a rabbit's foot for smoothing, polishing and wiping the surface of gold and silver. The small particles of metal should be collected in a leather apron. He must have small pottery vessels and cruets, and a toothed saw and file for gold as well as gold and silver wire with which broken objects can be mended or properly constructed. He must also be as skilled in engraving as well as in bas relief, in casting as well as in hammering. His apprentice must have a waxed table, or one covered with clay, for portraying little flowers and drawing in various ways. He must know how to distinguish pure gold from latten and copper, lest he buy latten for pure gold. For it is difficult to escape the wiliness of the fraudulent merchant."

Alexander of Neckham, 12th century
(quoted in Medieval Craftsmen: Goldsmiths)

Artistic Luxury Exhibit & Lecture

The Artistic Luxury: Fabergé, Tiffany, Lalique exhibit is here in town at the California Legion of Honor museum. This morning, I fought the rain and traffic in order to be able to attend Alan Revere’s lecture on The Art of Jewelry Making, as a bonus to the exhibit.

Here are a few of Alan’s words of wisdom (in making jewelry) that I walked away with:

- The quickest shortcut is to do it right the first time.
- It is a race for quality and not a race against time.
- There are 10 techniques but 10,000 tricks.

The exhibit captured the moment when these three designers rivaled each other at the 1900 Paris World's Fair. It was an event where each of them presented their most spectacular creations to show the world what they were capable of in order to win future commissions. It was an exciting time in design history.

At the turn of the 20th century, Art Nouveau (a design style and philosophy) spread throughout Europe. I remember my architecture history class where we studied about René Lalique’s bronze figures, Louis Comfort Tiffany’s stained glass, Charles Rennie Mackintosh’s Glasgow School of Art, Antoni Gaudí’s lava-like Sagrada Família, Victor Horta and the Vienna Secessionists, and Hector Guimard’s metro entrances.

Seeing the works of these masters at the exhibit, I feel sad to see some of the techniques are extinct or had gone out of favor. In this economic climate, I felt I had to keep my work simple so that they are affordable. Yet this exhibit inspires me to keep pushing my limits, learning new skills, and to not lose my sense of purpose.

Well Behaved Women Seldom Make History

As I was walking around the local library today, a book popped out at me. The name is “Well Behaved Women Seldom Make History”, by Laurel Thatcher Ulrich. She is a Pulitzer Prize winning author, and wrote these words in 1976.

Ulrich’s original quote first appeared in American Quarterly in spring of 1976, entitled “Virtuous Women Found: New England Ministerial Literature, 1668-1735.” The article begins with this paragraph:

"Cotton Mather called them 'the hidden ones.' They never preached or sat in a deacon's bench. Nor did they vote or attend Harvard. Neither, because they were virtuous women, did they question God or the magistrates. They prayed secretly, read the Bible through at least once a year, and went to hear the minister preach even when it snowed. Hoping for an eternal crown, they never asked to be remembered on earth. And they haven't been. Well-behaved women seldom make history."

Ulrich’s intention was not to incite behaviors like Britney Spears or Madonna, nor behaviors of history-changing women such as Joan of Arc or Rosa Parks. In her own words, she was “making a commitment to help recover the lives of otherwise obscure women.” Instead of being forgotten, she was trying to acknowledge ordinary women, calling for history to pay attention to these women and their local and domestic contributions.

Since 1976, her quote has taken on a life of its own, appearing on T-shirts, coffee mugs, bumper stickers and such. Today, many people associate the slogan “Well-behaved women seldom (or sometimes written as “rarely”) make history” with feminism. Without the suffragists, we wouldn’t have been able to vote today. Without Rosa Parks, would I have to go to the back of the bus even though I’m not Caucasian?

Can you remember the achievement of the following “Famous First” women: Elizabeth Ann Seton, Victoria Claflin Woodhull, Edith Wharton, Amelia Earhart, Shirley Chisholm, Sally Jean Priesand, Dr. Sally K. Ride, Geraldine Ferraro, Janet Reno, and Hillary Clinton.