Osnat Weingarden - Gold Jewelry Design

עברית

ZEN

The four basic elements – earth, air, fire and water – are the inspiration for my new Zen Collection, each symbolizing distinct components of the finished product:

Earth – Material, matter, minerals (such as gold, gems, pebbles and bamboo).

Air – Imagination and design, airiness and motion

Fire – Creativity, action and art, like the molten magma that cooled and became basalt.

Water – Emotion, heart, blood circulation, the flow of life.

My trip to Japan inundated my senses as I again contemplated the bonds linking humanity, nature and the environment, noting how rituals, traditional architecture and fascinating Zen gardens contrasted with a wealth of hi-tech innovations. I designed my own home, reflecting my infinite love for practical manual labor, setting up a Japanese garden in the yard. I studied with works of ancient Greek philosophers – Plato, Hippocrates and Aristotle – concerning the four elements, as well as books on astrology, Feng Shui and S.Y. Agnon’s Only Yesterday. My Zen Collection marks the culmination of these efforts.

Balance among elements is essential to the soul and to harmony in life. Natural products of the earth – pebbles and bamboo, combine with the fire within the basalt, with air and water, translated into textures and forms in gold. Each item includes all the elements in a harmonious blend of color, shape and texture. Each texture is the result of extensive experience and a variety of technologies: Gold working, wax carving, hammering, sawing, soldering, melting, engraving, stamping, molding, braiding and finishing, embodying a deep love for art and craftsmanship, as in Agnon’s story …

“In addition, they have a sea there, and if you bathe in it, it’s like bathing in a ritual bath, which removes the pollution on your body. And the sea has a great advantage over the ritual bath, for when a man comes out of the ritual bath he is sick from the smell, while the sea smells good. And those who aren’t strong enough to go down to the sea take sand baths. How? You dig yourself a kind of grade and you sit up to your navel in the sand and you are healed, for a man is crated from four elements, fire, wind, water and earth, and the sand of the sea includes four elements, fire wind water and earth. Fire is the sun that inflames the sand. Wind is what blows the sand apart. Water, for the sand comes from the sea. Earth, for the sand is also a kind of earth. Those four elements come and bring healing to man who was created of four elements”

 (Shmuel Yosef Agnon, Only Yesterday, Page 517, Princeton University Press, Published 2000)

CLEO  

The encounter with pure gold, its refinement and processing, began at the Julian Tiglat Studio in 1994. The powerful color, elasticity, impression and primordial nature of this noble metal enchanted and captivated me, evoking an immediate connection with all memories and sensations of my journeys to the east. Like an archæologist who discovers a treasure more precious than gold, I proceeded on my trek to the earliest cultures, as reflected in jewelry depicting Greek gods and kings of ancient Egypt. Using special technical skills, I created the CLEO Collection, comprising items bearing the forms, motifs and ornaments of the past, created through a combination of traditional and innovative technologies. Each item is hand-crafted, its production closely supervised by the artist. The process begins with melting pure gold, drawing wires, braiding chains, hammering special pendants and ensuring a perfect finish.

This collection was exhibited at prestigious shops and offered to private customers.

 GEO

 We moved to our Tel Aviv home in 1998. My exposure to different architectural styles and design of my home’s interior influenced the GEO Collection, featuring clean formal lines expressed in geometric and architectural shapes. These unconventionally designed items, of varying dimensions, are produced in yellow or white 18K gold, somewhat anemic compared with pure gold, with an unadorned matte texture, hand-polished and inlaid with diamonds and semi-precious gems.

 NEO

 The jewelries express womanhood, strength, passion, presence, uniqueness, sexuality, Initial, seduction, expression of prestige and beauty.