"Dazzle" one of the UK`s leading exhibitors of exciting and innovative modern contemporary jewellery seems to be going from strength to strength. Established in 1981 the Dazzle events are now held in Edinburgh, Glasgow, London and Manchester. Only the highest caliber of maker are invited to be showcased with prices from modest to luxurious. With such a well run and maintained reputation for showcasing and selling the very best of contemporary jewellery could the Dazzle showcase be rolled out in seperate shows for other design and craft discilpines to such effect? Or is it the insatiable hunger for contemporary jewellery from the public that keeps this events success seperate from other disciplines?
Images
1. Dazzle Logo 2009
2. Glasgow Dazzle event.
3. Manchester Dazzle event.
4. Victoriana necklace with curiosity. Alison Macleod
2 comments:
One of the best things baout dazzle is that it brings contemporary jewellery out of the sometimes intimidating gallery setting and brings it to a wider audience. It would be great to extend this to other disciplins.
Maybe it is beholden on me to comment.
Thanks for the compliments - much appreciated. Not everyone appreciates or approves of us (don't ask me why) so it is great when someone says nice things.
As one of the two so-called "Directors" of Dazzle,
firstly let me say what a brilliant idea this blog is. Great way of communicating about the applied arts in a chatty relaxed way. Hopefully attracting the thoughts of not just so-called "arty" people and arts writers.
I agree with the idea of taking contemporary applied art to the people in the way we do. However I guess we have it easy, in that jewellery is so portable - so simple to just pick up and leave (after paying of course). I think it is that, which sets us apart from other crafts. To our advantage.
I do agree - and this has been a long time hobbyhorse of mine - that makers in other crafts could go a long way towards what we have done, in finding venues where lots of like minded people pass through such as theatre foyers and utilise the spaces.
In Dazzle, we find that the general public who may not normally consider the possibility of buying good quality pieces but satisfy themselves with cheapo stuff, when faced with access to what we offer, go wild and get very excited. And buy. Often surprising themselves. So our market expands all the time. as we draw in new people. As compared with galleries and most exhibitions which seem to just target the same old people time after time.
I would like to see the SAC and other maker groups showing more imagination and flare in locating such venues. They are there - we always seem to find them.
We are back in Glasgow at Merchant Square in April and at the Edinburgh Festival again in August, where this year we face the so-called credit crunch and wonder how much of an impact it will have on attendances and on our sales.
I feel it is going to be a very tough year for makers in all disciplines. Galleries and shops are closing - especially South of the Border, so unless new outlets replace them, makers will possibly only have the internet to compensate them for this contracting market.
Dazzle has joined the pack and will bring its own selling website out in the late summer (of course inevitably we think ours will be better than the others). Even though we are a way from going actively on line we have been absolutely inundated with enquiries from hundreds of makers from all over Europe - most we have never even heard of. It is amazing how the jeweller grapevine works. It rather shows how worried makers are about the future.
Sadly, we have limits as to who we use on the site in the short term, so most will be disappointed. I guess we have the advantage of 400,000 visits already each year to our existing non-selling site and a 50,000 strong mailing list (a high proportion of them Scottish of course) built up over almost 30 years, which makes us an obvious good bet.
Let us just hope that the economy in Scotland is not as affected as over the border and that makers are somewhat insulated against the worst effects. You have amazing diverse high quality designers in depth, much more so pro rata than any other part of UK, a great advertisement for visiting Scotland.
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