Arijana Gadžijev
Slovanka, printed textile jewelry
for body and home by Arijana Gadžijev
Printed textile jewelry for
body and home Slovanka (eng. Slavic woman) is inspired by Slavic folk art, its
floral patterns and motifs. While researching and admiring the plants used as
typical folklore elements, I drew the patterns for printing and designed the
shapes of jewelry. As a textile designer I feel responsible to create small, sustainable and handmade collections like Slovanka. It is a “slow” collection, a tribute to art and craftsmanship, as each motif is first drawn by hand and later reworked on the computer, and in the final stage the fabric cuts are sewn by hand.
The patterns are carefully matched on the sides and edges, and the flat geometric shapes are printed on both sides so the piece can be worn on either side. The design consists of geometric shapes such as cubes, tetrahedrons, or hexagons, which are made as individual pieces that can be worn separately or strung together as a necklace or brooch. The pieces can be the same colour or different colour combinations.
The printed patterns are made with sublimatic printing on white, carefully selected and easy-care woven fabric left over from previous collections. There is no washing needed in the print process and the only left over from the print is the recyclable paper used for the packaging.
The jewelry is light and soft and does not contain fillers, so although it deforms when squeezed, it can easily be returned to its original shape. It can be worn on the body or as a home accessory - it can be placed on the living room table or hung on the bedroom wall, as a personal object, regardless of gender or age. It is versatile and can give a new character to the space we live in. As a reminder of the importance of folk cultural heritage, it praises the beauty of nature in a simple but sincere way and shows the interdependence between nature and man. I believe cultural heritage is our cultural DNA, a part of an individual's identity. It is a constant source of inspiration that I like to explore and express through the modern life we lead.
In my work I draw inspiration from nature, folklore, storytelling and also real-life stories, along with art, music, movies and the contemporary lifestyle of the modern world, with all the consumerism and consumption that comes with it. With this in mind, I began to design things on a smaller scale and became interested in so-called "mini-textiles", with textile jewelry for the body and home being the main artistic medium. And that's how Slovanka, my first textile jewelry collection, was born.
Arijana Gadžijev, M. A., is a textile designer and artist from Ljubljana, Slovenia. She is employed as an assistant at the University of Ljubljana, Faculty of Natural Sciences and Engineering, Department of Textiles, Graphics Arts and Design. She works both independently and in collaboration with other designers and artists, taking part in solo and group exhibitions at home and abroad.
Since 2019 her main artistic medium is expressed through printed textile jewelry for body and home. In 2021 she received the BIGSEE International Product Design Award 2021 for the printed textile jewelrySlovanka. Her textile jewelry collections were exhibited at Textile Art Biennial BIEN 2021, Blickfang Wien 2021 at MAK –Museum of Applied Arts in Vienna, Slovenian Jewelry Week 2022, Milano Jewelry Week 2022, international traveling exhibition “On the move, jewels” in Enschede and Madrid. Her work was featured in Arte Y Joya Contemporary Jewellery Yearbook 2021/22 and 22/23. She is a member of Klimt02.
In her work she combines both manual and digital design techniques and likes to explore how the pattern works on a particular textile form, how it moves around a particular 3D object, how it fits into the seam and how it can visually change the image of the form. Coming from a textile design background, she thinks of jewelry as something soft and light. She also likes the idea of a product being versatile: as a necklace with a pendant, other times as a brooch, and sometimes as a wall decoration.
http://www.arijanagadzijev.com/
https://www.arijanagadzijev.com/slovanka
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