RMIT Gold and Silversmithing is a specialist discipline comprising of two concurrent streams of study in Jewellery and Silversmithing. This is offered at a specialist focused BA program and leads to a PhD by project. It is based on a sequential development to a high level of technology and understanding of the aesthetics in contemporary jewellery.

There is an intellectual challenge to make objects of jewellery and utensils that have a contemporary aesthetic. Current issues are examined, questioned and interpreted to provide a range of distinctive personal statements.

The fusion of historic and contemporary processes combined with a diversity of materials is a basis for making objects. The encounter with contemporary issues and meaning of object and its location with the person are another basis of working.

Conceptual, technical and artistic accomplishments are the endeavor of the student gold and silversmith at RMIT. We look for innovative and talented students who have an artistic aptitude and a strong interest in contemporary jewellery and hollow-ware and the making of the precious object. The extensive new studios are well equipped to meet the cross-disciplinary rigor of the discipline.

Student work has continued to be recognized both nationally and internationally. National prizes like the Toowoomba Contemporary Wearables, The Hobart Prize, Object Design Awards and locally Craft Victoria Fresh Awards, Buda Gold and Silversmith’s Award, The Rusden Foundation Award, The Kirsten Albrecht Award, The Australian and Decorative Fine Art Award have continued to be won by RMIT students and graduates. There have been ongoing invitations to exhibit abroad at prestigious venues such as the Talente and Schmuck in Munich, Galerie Marzee 2004 and the “Galerie Ra diploma 97”exhibition in Holland. The Herbert Hoffman Award in Munich has been won by RMIT graduates.

At the beginning of 2004, RMIT Gold and Silversmithing hosted the Jewellers and Metalsmith’s Group of Australia (JMGA) biennial conference in Melbourne. Titled, INHERITED FUTURES: TECHNOLOGIES TO TRAP IDEAS, the conference featured presentations by 25 local and international speakers and numerous exhibitions by leading practitioners. A publication of conference proceedings is forthcoming.

In 2002 RMIT Gold and Silversmithing hosted an international symposium/workshop. Conducted by Dr. Ian Ferguson from Manchester University, it focused on the demonstration of the new manufacturing processes of solid state diffusion of layered metals. A number of younger emerging Australian craftspeople were also invited to participate and work alongside the international and noted craftspeople.

The finished works, in conjunction with the patterned and coloured research pieces produced at the symposium, were exhibited at Project Space in Melbourne in July 2003.A book/catalogue with essays and visual text on the project is available.

A major exhibition of hollowware by twelve RMIT graduates titled ‘Australian Silver’ was shown at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London during 2000 and then toured Asian venues.

In 1998 at the pre-eminent “Cicely and Colin Rigg Award” (the richest craft prize in Australia) selected by the National Gallery of Victoria, seventeen of the twenty selected were educated at RMIT. The winner of the prize was Robert Baines, then studio coordinator of RMIT Gold and Silversmithing.

In 1997 the first Post Doctoral Research Fellowship in Gold and Silversmithing was initiated. In 2004 Nicole Jacquard (USA) was the first Ph.D research in Gold and Silversmithing.

Gold and Silversmithing Staff

2008 B.A. (Fine Art) – Gold and Silversmithing Courses

Casting for Small Objects - VART1976
Gold and Silversmithing Enamelling – VART1974
Gold and Silversmithing 1B1 - VART 1919
Gold and Silversmithing 1B2 - VART 1920
Gold and Silversmithing 1B3 - VART 1921
Gold and Silversmithing 2B1 - VART 1972
Gold and Silversmithing 2B2 – VART1973
Advanced Studio 3 – VART3014
Advanced Studio 4 – VART3016

List of Global Links
RMIT Gold and Silversmithing has had student exchanges to Edinburgh University (UK), Central St. Martins (UK), Rietvelt Academy, Sandberg Institute (Netherlands), New Paltz (USA), Michigan (USA), Munich Academy (Germany).

List of Prizes in Gold &Silversmithing

• Emily Hope Award for final year students for a figurative work.
• Wolf Wennrich Award for craftsmanship in the final year.

• Klepner’s Annual Award for best-limited production series in the final year.

• Koodak Awards for best first, second and third year students.
• Don Begbie Award for excellence in Gold and Silversmithing in the final year

• Kathlyn Harris Fashion Jewellery Award in the final year
• Ernst Fries Silversmithing Award for Second Year
• Debbie Sheezel Award for Excellence in Enamelling

Graduate Achievements

International Profile

• Susan Cohn – ‘Cohncave’ commissioned by Alessi as part of their production range in 1990.
• Dr. Stuart Devlin, designer of the commemorative Sydney 2000 Olympic coins and the Para-Olympic Games; designer of Australia’s decimal coinage.
• Robert Baines invited keynote speaker to Nocturnos 2001, exhibition Staatliche Antikensammlungen Germany and three senior research fellowships at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in NY

Research profile

• Robert Baines, Winston Churchill Fellowship1979; Senior Scholar Fulbright Award 1997; Andrew Mellon Conservation Fellowship at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York 1999, 2002.

Prizes and Awards

• Margaret West, Carlier Makigawa and Robert Baines, Australia Council Fellowships
• Mark Edgoose, 1995 National Craft Award, 1996 - Deacons, Graham and James Arts 21
• Robert Baines, 1997 - Cicely and Colin Rigg Award, 1998 - Seppelt Contemporary Art Award
• Beatrice Schlabowsky, 1999 - Presiding Officers’ Craft Prize, Canberra, 2003 - Australian Decorative and Fine Art Award.

• Joung Mee Do, 1999 winner at ‘Silver ‘99’, 6th Bicentennial Ernest Leviny Exhibition; 1999 - Grand Prize, Itami International Jewellery Competition.
• Vanessa Raimondo, 1998 OBJECT Magazine Award.
• Eugene Ginn Minn Chua, (MFA), 1999 Product Design Award, Itami International Jewellery Competition.
• Makiko Mitsunari, 2002 Grand Prize, Itami International Jewellery Competition.
• Mari Funaki, Herbert Hoffman Prize, Munich, 1996, 1999
• Sally Marsland, Herbert Hoffman Prize, Munich 2002, OZ Gold 2002
• Nick Bastin, Souvenir 2002

Artist Designer Studios Studio Galleries initiated by graduates show casing leading contemporary Australian and International work.

• Mari Funaki - Gallery Funaki; Ali Limb and Emma Goodsir -EG et al; Michael Fletcher and Sarah Jane Ross - Studio Ingot; Robyn Wernicke - Smallspace Gallery; Julie Carter; Kate Harris - Charles Smith Gallery; Alice Euphemia – Caroline Price

International touring exhibitions

• 2001 - Asialink “Foundations of Gold” , Makiko Mitsunari, Eugene Gin-Min Chua, Simon Cottrell, touring Melbourne and 5 venues throughout asia.
• 2000 -Twelve RMIT graduates ‘Australian Silver’, Victoria and Albert Museum, London.
• 2000 - Eight RMIT graduates, ‘Australia 2000’, Lesley Craze Gallery, July, London.
• Simon Cottrell, Myung-ok Shin, and Kirsten Haydon, Talente 2000, the international exhibition in Munich.

• Renata Dabal and Louise Vilde Talente 2003.
• 1999 -Seventeen staff and graduates of the gold and silversmithing area had a touring exhibition titled “Trace” at the Museum of Art Craft, ITAMI, Gallery Yu, Tokyo.
• 1997 - Eleven RMIT gold and silversmiths formed the core of the “Contemporary Vessels and Jewels” exhibitioned at the Shanghai Museum, curated by the Queensland Art Gallery.
• 1996 -Six RMIT gold and silversmiths exhibited in Korea, India, Pakistan, Kathmandu and Singapore in the Asia Link “Aurora” exhibition.

International Influence

• Carlier Makigawa, judge ITAMI, International Jewellery Competition

• Kirstin Haydon, ‘Poppy’s Poppies’, Auckland Museum, New Zealand
• Robert Baines, Jewellery Master classes Estonia, Germany and New Zealand

• Community Leadership
• Mark Edgoose, Ian Ferguson, Jan Donaldson President of JMGA(Vic)

Establishment of Private Schools

• Viliama Grakalic, Monica Swaja

Arts Administration

• Roweena Gough, Arts Victoria. Catherine Gaultier, Colleen Burke, RMIT Union Arts. Carlier Makigawa, Australia Council

Museum, Gallery Administration

• Daniel McOwan, Director of Hamilton Regional Gallery. Marisia Lukasczewski, curator Maroondah Art Gallery till 2002 and now at Craft West, Western Australia

Residencies

• Robert Baines, Waikato Polytechnic N.Z. ;Carlier Makigawa Seoul University, Korea; Myung-ok Shin, Jam Factory Adelaide; Joung Mee Do, Anna Davern, Simona Chytil, Pyrmont Studios; Sydney. Nick Bastin, Tokyo; Pearl Gillies, Barcelona; Kirsten Haydon, Antarctic