UW-Milwaukee Art Students Display Handcraft

Metalsmithing major Ryan Socia displayed an array of crafts and necklaces formed from recycled scrap plastic and empty bullet casings he collects from a shooting range. He also uses scrap metals and plastics gathered from a junkyard near his home to imbue a “darker, grittier” theme to his work.

He was one of several UW-Milwaukee art students who displayed their hand-crafted creations Nov. 17 in the Student Union at the annual contemporary craft sale.

Presented by Object, UWM’s student jewelry and metalsmithing student organization, the sale had a free admission preview Sunday evening at the Villa Terrace Decorative Arts Museum for students to sell their work to the public for a short period before the day-long event at UWM. Students from the Peck School of the Arts Art and Design program create their own lines, personal brand and style allowing the sale a large variety of unique original art.

Everything that doesn’t sell at the Village Terrace preview is presented on seven or eight student displays all day, manned by the student artists themselves.

Senior Nora Elhers displayed her copper and enamel works – shaped copper splashed with different bursts of color created from one single enamel. Different colors can emerge on the metal depending on the firing heat and cleanliness of the kiln, or the different reactions of glass fusions on metal, she explains, giving each piece a look that cannot be easily replicated.  Communicating control versus the loss thereof, or giving up that control drives her creativity and is the essential rampant theme in her work.

Sculpture major Alex Gugg has been working with metal since he was 12, gaining the interest from his father, a goldsmith. “Metal is so…pliable, bendable, connectable, you can make it thinner or thicker,” Gugg explains of his love of his craft.

Students are offered a place in the sale if they are enrolled in certain construction and fabrication courses, and sometimes are required to present work for other classes such as the Craft and Marketing course. Object’s social media and networking Director Rachel Davis explains that while most of the students involved are specifically tied to metalsmithing and jewelry courses, Object hopes to expand the shows range from mostly jewelry outward, to invite a wider range of artists and a more diverse selection of works such as ceramics, sculptures and more in the future. Many of the current works are stone setting pieces and metalsmithed jewelry.

Peck School of the Arts students in conjunction with Object have several workplaces to perfect their metalsmithing craft; the main Kenwood studio, the Digital Craft and Research Lab and Forming areas located at Kenilworth Square East. Object’s main goal is to partner with the UWM metals department and bring more understanding about the craft of metalsmithing.