Wearable art, also known as Artwear or "art to wear", refers to art pieces in the shape of clothing or jewellery pieces. These pieces are usually handmade, and are produced only once or as a very limited series. Pieces of clothing are often made with fibrous materials and traditional techniques such as crochet, knitting, quilting, but may also include plastic sheeting, metals, paper, and more. While the making of any article of clothing or other wearable object typically involves aesthetic considerations, the term wearable art implies that the work is intended to be accepted as an artistic creation or statement. Wearable art is meant to draw attention while it is being displayed, modeled or used in performances. Pieces may be sold and exhibited.
Anni Albers was a German textile artist and printmaker credited with blurring the lines between traditional craft and art.
Besides surface qualities, such as rough and smooth, dull and shiny, hard and soft, textiles also includes colour, and, as the dominating element, texture, which is the result of the construction of weaves. Like any craft it may end in producing useful objects, or it may rise to the level of art.
Art jewelry is one of the names given to jewelry created by studio craftspeople. As the name suggests, art jewelry emphasizes creative expression and design, and is characterized by the use of a variety of materials, often commonplace or of low economic value. In this sense, it forms a counterbalance to the use of "precious materials" in conventional or fine jewelry, where the value of the object is tied to the value of the materials from which it is made. Art jewelry is related to studio craft in other media such as glass, wood, plastics and clay; it shares beliefs and values, education and training, circumstances of production, and networks of distribution and publicity with the wider field of studio craft. Art jewelry also has links to fine art and design.
Arline Fisch is an American artist and educator. She is known for her work as a metalsmith and jeweler, pioneering the use of textile processes from crochet, knitting, plaiting, and weaving in her work in metal. She developed groundbreaking techniques for incorporating metal wire and other materials into her jewelry.
Mary Lee Hu is an American artist, goldsmith, and college level educator known for using textile techniques to create intricate woven wire jewelry.
Joyce J. Scott is an African-American artist, sculptor, quilter, performance artist, installation artist, print-maker, lecturer and educator. Named a MacArthur Fellow in 2016, and a Smithsonian Visionary Artist in 2019, Scott is best known for her figurative sculptures and jewelry using free form, off-loom beadweaving techniques, similar to a peyote stitch. Each piece is often constructed using thousands of glass seed beads or pony beads, and sometimes other found objects or materials such as glass, quilting and leather. In 2018, she was hailed for working in new medium — a mixture of soil, clay, straw, and cement — for a sculpture meant to disintegrate and return to the earth. Scott is influenced by a variety of diverse cultures, including Native American and African traditions, Mexican, Czech, and Russian beadwork, illustration and comic books, and pop culture.
June Schwarcz was an American enamel artist who created tactile, expressive objects by applying technical mastery of her medium to vessel forms and plaques, which she considers non-functional sculpture.
Kay Sekimachi is an American fiber artist and weaver, best known for her three-dimensional woven monofilament hangings as well as her intricate baskets and bowls.
Lisa Walker is a contemporary New Zealand jeweller.
Areta Rachael Wilkinson is a New Zealand jeweller.
Dorothy Caldwell is a Canadian fibre artist. Her work consists primarily of abstract textile based wall hangings that utilize techniques such as wax-resist, discharge dyeing, stitching, mark-making, and appliqué.
Ramona Solberg (1921–2005) created eccentric yet familiar jewelry using found objects; she was an influential teacher at the University of Washington School of Art and is often referred to as the "grandmother of Northwest found-art jewelry". Additionally, she served as an art instructor and a prolific jewelry artist in and around Seattle for three decades.
Art Jewelry Forum (AJF) is a nonprofit international organization founded in 1997 that advocates for the field of contemporary art jewelry through education, discourse, publications, grants, and awards.
Lola Brooks is an educator specializing in jewelry. Brooks' works have been shown at places such as the National Ornamental Metal Museum, The Society of Arts and Crafts, Cleveland Museum of Natural History, the Museum of Craft and Folk Art, and Talente and are held in the permanent collection of The Museum of Art and Design, the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Marjorie Schick was an innovative American jewelry artist and academic who taught art for 50 years. Approaching sculptural creations, her avant-garde pieces have been widely collected. Her works form part of the permanent collections of many of the world's leading art museums, including the Hermitage Museum in Saint Petersburg, Russia; the Museum of Arts and Design in New York City; the National Museum of Modern Art in Kyoto, Japan; the Philadelphia Museum of Art in Pennsylvania; and the Victoria and Albert Museum of London.
Audrey Dear Hesson is a Canadian practical craft artist, mainly working with pottery, sculpture, jewelry and textile. She is a member of the Canadian Women Artists History Initiative and was the first black Canadian to graduate from the Nova Scotia College of Art. She is the only living artist in the exhibition curated by David Woods called Discovery: African Nova Scotian Art Pioneers.
Hanne Behrens is a Danish goldsmith and master of textile techniques who specializes in weaving precious metals. Her work is known for its intricate weaving paired with clean lines and shapes. Her work has won numerous international awards. She studied under Arline Fisch and Mary Lee Hu, both metal textile artists, but Behrens has developed her own techniques and distinct visual style. She works primarily in high karat golds and silver. She frequently incorporates found objects such as shells into her weavings.
Jan Yager is an American artist who makes mixed media jewelry. She draws inspiration from both the natural world and the lived-in human environment of her neighborhood in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, emphasizing that art is a reflection of both time and place. She has incorporated rocks, bullet casings, and crack cocaine vials into her works, and finds beauty in the resilience of urban plants that some would consider weeds.
Sara Radstone is a British ceramic artist and lecturer. Her work ranges from intimate wall based sculpture to large scale installations of multiple elements.
Mary Ann Scherr was an American designer, metalsmith and educator. She was known for her jewellery design and industrial design, but she also worked as a graphic designer, illustrator, game designer, fashion and costume designer and silversmith.
