Gabi Dziuba & Friends: Shared Authorship, Wearability, and Whatever…
By Liesbeth den Besten
AJF Art Jewelry Forum
Gabi Dziuba & Friends
February 25–May 26, 2024
Schmuckmuseum Pforzheim, Pforzheim, Germany
“SPLASH” shout the pendants and rings. “EGAL EGAL” (“whatever,” in English) clamor white gold and diamond rings in an effort to appease. “OH” screams a pair of red earrings, the letters dripping bloodily in the Rocky Horror Picture Show font. Blue beans and match pendants glow in vibrant enameled color, zirconia, and shining silver. Kermit laughs out loud on a white gold ring, his mouth studded with rubies, one eye a big white diamond, the other a black one. Square pendants yell “ZOMBIE BABY,” “ACCEPT,” “ICE,” “GAGA,” and more.
Words, letters, sayings, and comic figures are carried out in shining materials and with great skill. Welcome to the world of Gabi Dziuba & Friends, where haute couture and the underground, chic and trash, all meet in an uncomplicated and humorous way. In this world, authorship is not claimed or disputed but shared.
The friends of Gabi Dziuba (b. 1954) are well-known German visual artists of different generations. The exhibition at the Schmuckmuseum Pforzheim celebrates Dziuba’s unique years-long collaborations, together with an extensive overview of her own work since the 1970s.
After studying in Pforzheim under Reinhold Reiling from 1972 to 1978, Dziuba continued her studies under Hermann Jünger at the Munich Academy of Fine Arts from 1978 to 1983. In Munich she met visual artists such as Günther Förg (1952–2013) and Hans-Jörg Mayer (b. 1955) with whom she has collaborated since. Through Förg and his artistic circle she met other artists, including the Austrian Heimo Zobernig (b. 1958).
In 2006 he designed her beautiful though unreadable (thanks to the quirky layout) monograph, a book that her friends had regularly insisted she produce. When she settled in Berlin in 2009, she invited him to design her shop at Rosa-Luxemburg-Platz.
Part of its interior, such as the large table display cases and the lamps of mirrored foil and synthetic Swarovski crystals, is now in Pforzheim’s jewelry museum, where it catches the eye in the spacious exhibition hall dedicated to the work of the artist friends. Installed close to the shop interior is a monumental monochrome white painting by Zobernig. When one approaches it, it lights up because of the reflections of tiny Swarovski stones.
To read the complete feature on this exhibition at the AJF website, tap here!
