Diana Greenwood
My work, which includes silver jewellery and vessels as well as wooden framed pieces [for wall or mantel], is inspired by the garden and the creative process of gardening; my passion for gardening feeding my passion for working in metal.
In my work I seek to emphasise the organic shapes and forms of leaves, plants and flowers and to capture brief ephemeral moments in nature such as the falling of a leaf or the glancing touch of one petal against another. Through silver, embellished at times with gold and semi-precious stones, I use simple geometric shapes and forms, such as circles and squares, to create boundaries for natural creations like the agapanthus, anemone or cranesbill. The result, as for a gardener, is a balance between the organic and the controlled, profusion and containment.
Initial sketches, drawn from observation, photographs or botanical illustrations are indispensable to my work as I endeavour to ensure my finished product remains true to the clean simple lines of those early sketches.
The larger boxed pieces give me free rein to tell a story, drawn from my own experiences or observations, by playing with combinations of metal, paper collage and objets trouvés. As with my jewellery I strive to capture that sense of a fleeting moment in time, of momentary recollection. Like gardening, they do not always turn out the way I planned, but they always take me on a journey, in which I am a willing participant, from the earliest glimpse of an idea, through nurturing, to the fully developed finished piece.
Education
1991-93 ROYAL COLLEGE OF ART
Masters Degree: Goldsmithing, Silversmithing, Metalwork and Jewellery
1987-90 MANCHESTER POLYTECHNIC
BA (HONS) Three Dimensional Design
Competitions and Awards
1999 Invited artist to the Birmingham Jewellery Quarter Logo Design Competition
1998 Awarded a London Arts Board Grant
1997 Cutlery for the ‘Sheffield Millennium Canteen’
1996 Best Newcomers Prize- Chelsea Crafts Fair
1996 Finalist- Carroll Foundation Award- Chelsea Crafts Fair
1995 Winner of the P&O Makower Silver Commission for the Crafts Council Collection
1994 Awarded a Crafts Council Setting-up Grant
Exhibitions
2008 ‘Group: Individual’ New Ashgate Gallery, Farnham, Surrey
2005/6 ‘Making it Yours: Metal’, Crafts Council Gallery, London
2005 ‘Boxed ‘n’ Cased’, Hastings Museum and Art Gallery
2004 ‘Hidden Art Revealed’, Geffrye Museum Design Centre, London
2003 ‘Silver Sparks!’ The Gilbert Collection, Somerset House, London
2002 ‘Cutting Design’, Geffrye Museum Design Centre, London
2001 ‘British Silver’, Gallery Tactus, Copenhagen, Denmark
2001 ‘Bishopsland Retrospective’, Jelly Leg’d Chicken Arts, Reading
2001 ‘Spoons, Big and Small’, Lesley Craze Gallery, London
2000 ‘Young Silversmiths’, The Scottish Gallery, Edinburgh
2000 ‘Full Bloom’, Crafts Council Gallery Shop, London
‘Silver 2000’, Galerie Marzee, Nijmegen, Netherlands
‘Jewels for the Year 2000’, Lesley Craze Gallery, London
‘Spoons’, The Scottish Gallery, Edinburgh
Teaching
1997-02 London Guildhall University, Various projects with Levels 2 & 3
1994-96 Royal College of Art, Specifically on the ‘Batch Production Project’
Commissions
1997 Silver Cutlery for the ‘Sheffield Millennium Canteen’
1996 ‘Hot and Cold’, Silver Bath Oil Vessels, commissioned by the Crafts Council
Articles
Corinne Julius, Design News, Homes and Property section, Evening Standard, 13th March 2002
Katie Campbell, Design News, Homes and Property section, page19, Evening Standard,
3rd October 2001
Nilgin Yusuf, Article, ELLE Magazine, Oct 1997
Liz Hoggard, ‘Aromatherapy on Tap’, CRAFTS, Nov/Dec, page 11 1996
David Beasley, Silver Initiatives, GOLDSMITHS REVIEW 1996
Sophie Chamier, Best Buys, The Knowledge, YOU Magazine, 14th May 1995
Drusilla Beyfuss, A Feast of Silver, TELEGRAPH Magazine, February 1993
Collections
Crafts Council Silver Collection (P&O Makower Award)
British Council Collection
Collection of Wendy Ramshaw and David Watkins
Collection of The Royal College of Art