I'm not sure if any Irenebrination readers already tried playing with Rijksmuseum's Rijksstudio, but, if you have done so, you will agree with me about it being highly addictive.
Considered as one of the world’s leading museums, to celebrate its re-opening in April 2013 Amsterdam's Rijksmuseum recently launched this very special online archive comprising 125,000 works from its collection.
Yet, rather than being a passive archive this is an active tool of discovery. Rijksstudio offers indeed the chance to register, access the museum collection and download ultra high-resolution images or sections and details of specific artworks.
The brilliant news is that this is a free service that genuinely prompts the museum's real and virtual visitors to use the collection in a creative way.
But that's not all: the museum also asked international artists, designers and architects to select one work from the collection and create an entirely new piece. Design group Droog created for example a tattoo inspired by a still life painting by Jan Davidsz de Heem from the 17th Century, but designers will be able to get inspired by an amazing amount of artworks and create new products, from shirts and cushions to scooters, as the site shows.
I totally enjoyed the idea of using digital technology to inspire people through beauty and prompt them to be creative. Giving access to a huge museum collection means to democratise art, but offering the chance to users from all over the world to browse and enjoy an archive with thousands of pieces is something truly amazing.
Since I really liked this initiative by the Rijksmuseum I decided to unleash my creativity as well moving from some of the images in the collection. I thought it was a bit reductive to use one of the beautiful artworks for a shirt of a print of some kind, so I decided to twist my inspirations a little bit and come up with a necklace with some themes inspired by three images from the Rijksmuseum archives.
So first of all, let's look at the images: the first one, from 1855-1865 shows two children playing in a forest brook; the second is a portrait of a woman with two children at an outside table (by Geldolph Adriaan Kessler) and the last one shows a neighborhood party in Tarwehof and was taken in 1986 by Theo Baart.
I borrowed the themes of children playing freely in a forest and the acid yellow palette from the first picture; the vegetation and the trees plus the theme of children playing in the outdoors come from the second and the bicycles are taken from the third image.
The materials I employed are as usual not extremely expensive, there's driftwood (like in the previous necklace, again it took me a while to clean it, polish and paint it, but it was definitely worth it!), a few figurines and tiny trees, green sponge for the bushes, fluorescent yellow ropes and metal clips (for that added playground feel...).
The final message is a very positive one - let the kids play, let them enjoy themselves and be free and happy. A bit trite and banal? Unfortunately not: there are still quite a few countries where children's rights aren't respected and we live in a society that too often economically exploits (think about the fashion industry...) and physically mistreats children (without counting wars, diseases and hardships...), so maybe using a piece of performative jewellery to remind ourselves about children's rights and spread the message wouldn't be such a bad idea.
Member of the Boxxet Network of Blogs, Videos and Photos
Member of the Boxxet Network of Blogs, Videos and Photos
I adore your samples of fashion accessories. They are really needed if you want to dress up in a way that will impress people and make a mark. Thanks for your input in this matter, it's highly valuable and appreciated.
Posted by: adult onesie australia | November 14, 2012 at 05:56 AM