Alternative Views by Larah Nott and Jo Hawley at Bilk Gallery: striking jewellery

Larah Nott and Jo Hawley are two contemporary artists who work in metal. Hawley is from Melbourne and Nott is based in Canberra. Both artists make jewellery that attracts attention by its innovative design and wearability. While striking in appearance, their designs do not overpower the wearer by their presence.

These two artists seem to have more in common than the title of the exhibition suggests. They have both studied jewellery making with an emphasis on engineering technology. They have both attended Melbourne Institutes of Technology and they both have the ability to exploit the potential of working with metal and the knowledge of the processes involved. They use these skills in a range of metal techniques involving welding, waterjet cutting and hand finishing as well as using silver, titanium and stainless steel. They are also both influenced by the concept of space. Hawley considers the space delineated by her shapes and forms. Nott considers interior space and the function it performs.

Nott has been studying the interiors of concert halls for several years and has embarked on a series of works based on interiors such as the Bridgewater Hall in Manchester, the Berlin Philharmonic Hall, the Philharmonic de Paris, the Harbin Opera House in China and the Hamer Hall in Melbourne. It seems improbable that the vast interior space of a concert hall can be used as a blueprint for a piece of jewellery such as a bangle, brooch or necklace. But this is exactly what Nott has done.

Using a profile of the interior space of an auditorium, Nott has created its characteristic "footprint". A close examination of the plan of these concert houses will confirm the relationship to the jewellery model that Nott has made. She has constructed these profiles as tiny cutout "models" in lightweight anodised titanium to be worn as brooches. Although light in weight, some of these brooches can look rather heavy and awkward in appearance such as the brooch based on the Harbin Opera House in China. In contrast, the Hamer Hall brooch is a successful translation of such a footprint. Made in an intense anodised pink titanium, its round shape opens to reveal the interior levels of space. It is a literal translation of the building but is also mindful of its function as a piece of jewellery.

The suite of bangles in anodised titanium with motifs inspired by the Bridgewater Hall in Manchester and the Philharmonic de Paris are particularly attractive. You can choose from a pattern of stylised birds or sinuous curving lines cut out of the flat metal surround of the bangle. In other works, the architectural footprint of these concert halls have been used to suggest simple open shapes to be linked or strung on necklaces and neck pieces. The Bridgewater Hall necklaces of linked shapes have all the gravitas of ceremonial regalia while the Spoke necklaces and the Harbin neck pieces are more playful.

Jo Hawley is also influenced by space but it is the structural space delineated by her shapes and embraced by her half-shell forms (based on sound shells) and pods. Hawley's first degree was in art history and literature before she studied jewellery so this body of work perhaps reflects both these disciplines. She writes: "I refer to my pieces as multicomponent pieces. I often describe my pods and half shells as being letters, the 'components' as words." She then explains that these components become her language and a way of expressing herself and seeing the world. This gives an illuminating insight into Hawley's work as you are drawn into this encoded group of shapes and forms created in pristine white or blackened silver and metal. Hawley employs a complex process involving special metal compounds and acid baths to create her brilliant ice white matt silver jewellery. In some works, Hawley uses the letter D to create links in necklaces (the D-ring chain) or as shapes to define the structure of a bracelet (D-shape black and D-shape silver). In other works, the letter D forms shapes that give a decorative patterned edge to a square bracelet (square with outline black) or are part of the construction of the bracelet itself. The "cluster words" are created as half silver shells and pods that hang loosely together on a neck piece or from fine chains. Unlike the rigid structure of the bracelets, these shells and pods hang tantalisingly free and their tactile quality would encourage a constant relationship between them and those who wear them. Hawley's brooches are of particular interest as their simple pod and shell shapes display to great advantage their soft silver forms and light-reflecting surfaces.

Hawley uses very little in the way of extraneous decoration in her jewellery. Its appeal lies in its finely constructed component parts that come together to make a statement of uncompromising refinement and design.