The Art of Craft: A Striking New Jewelry Collection From Van Cleef & Arpels Draws Inspiration From Titian, Picasso, and Shakespeare

The Art of Craft is an ongoing series in which Artnet News
shares the story behind the making of a special design
object.

In Paris last fall, the French
fine jewelry house Van Cleef & Arpels debuted its Romeo and Juliet
collection, a set of 100 pieces that pay homage to Shakespeare’s
ever-popular play and its star-crossed lovers. 

The collection, which will make
its US debut in the coming months, artfully brings to
life scenes and
characters from Shakespeare’s beloved tragedy by assigning meaning
to the gemstones’ color palettes: the Montagues are represented by rich blues,
supplied by lapis lazuli and sparkling sapphires, while the
Capulets are present through warmer tones in rubies, orange
sapphires, and garnets.

The palettes—and feuding
families—intertwine on most of the pieces, which were modeled after
opulent, Renaissance-style jewelry. One necklace, for example,
features a whopping 42-carat Sri Lankan sapphire, framed by a
double row of baguette-cut diamonds that sit high upon and closely
follow the shape of the wearer’s neck, in homage to a jewelry style
that was popular style
in the 15th and 16th centuries.

The entire collection nods not
only to Renaissance literature, but to all of the period’s art
forms, and two pairs of earrings—the pearl-set Lucia earrings and
the ruby-and-diamond clad “Kiss At the Balcony” earrings—are
inspired in particular by visual art. 

The Lucia earrings reference Renaissance-era portraiture, in which
noblewomen and royalty often posed wearing rare pearls.
In Titian’s
Portrait of a Lady In
White from around
1561, for example, the model wears a pearl choker, earrings, and
hair decoration, while the sitter in Lavinia Fontana’s Portrait of a Noblewoman
from 1580 has an elaborate
pearl-encrusted headpiece.

The Lucia earrings, parts of
which are also detachable should the wearer want to vary the look
and length, were crafted to update the opulent spirit of such paintings.
To highlight their brilliance, the
earrings’ two natural pearls were also decorated with delicate pink
and white diamonds and rubies. Together, they weigh a total of
10.35 carats. 

The Kiss At the Balcony
earrings, meanwhile, reference Romeo and Juliet’s stolen balcony
kiss. But they are also influenced significantly Pablo Picasso’s
1925 work, The
Kiss. 

Mimicking the movement and rose
tones of Picasso’s intertwined figures, the earrings
feature rubies against diamonds and pearls, which contrast
strikingly. The
square-cut rubies—collectively a callback to Picasso’s Cubist
works—also feature a subtle, three-dimensional relief that allows
the earrings to catch light and appear differently depending on
where the wearer is standing. And like the Lucia pieces, the
earrings were also designed to be partly
detachable. 

Additionally, the Romeo and
Juliet collection will debut alongside artworks by Italian artist
Lorenzo Mattoti, who created floor-to-ceiling watercolors depicting
the Verona palazzo where Romeo wooed Juliet for the first
time for the
Paris-based presentation. Mattoti’s works will also be on display when
the jewelry makes its US debut later this year. An accompanying catalogue featuring more of
his illustrations will be available from Van Cleef &
Arpels. 

The collection was also inspired by dancer and choreographer
Benjamin Millepied’s contemporary ballet
production,f Romeo and Juliet, which he presented
in Los Angeles last fall, says Nicholas Bos, president of Van
Cleef & Arpels.

“When Benjamin Millepied—whose work we have supported for the
past several years—told us
that he was working on a contemporary adaptation of Romeo and
Juliet, it struck me as a remarkable creative opportunity,”
Bos said in a statement.

“Shakespeare’s masterpiece acts as the starting point for a new
thematic collection, but also for a dialogue between disciplines
involving high jewelry, dance, music, and the visual arts.”

The post The Art of Craft: A Striking New Jewelry Collection
From Van Cleef & Arpels Draws Inspiration From Titian, Picasso, and
Shakespeare appeared first on artnet News.