Ornament is the leading magazine celebrating wearable art. Explore jewelry, fashion, beads; contemporary, ancient and ethnographic.
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48 ORNAMENT 35.5.2012 RIPPLES NECKLACE of sterling silver and colored aluminum; forged, fabricated, 2007. remarks, "Jewelry is so poignant—it has the ability to define us! What a privilege it is to be able to create such dear objects, objects that may even become heirlooms." Gold was born and raised on Chicago's South Side, and enjoyed regular trips to the city's museums and theaters. In particular, she remembers an encounter with Georges Seurat's A Sunday on La Grande Jatte at the Art Institute of Chicago. She was young, and this was one of the few paintings she could see at eye level. She stood close to the painting and admired all of the colorful little dots, then stepped back and saw the dots transform into a big picture, amazed by the magic of art. Later, as a twelve-year-old, on an outing into the city with her friends, she discovered a bead store and began making regular visits there to purchase materials for jewelry. She recalls, "With an innocent concern for design, a pile of findings, and my father's pliers, I built my first jewelry." Her parents strongly encouraged academics, and did not initially encourage Gold to pursue art. Her father, Harry Schildcrout, was a social worker, and according to Gold, "His work was always about people. He was always concerned about the human condition." He was puzzled at first by her interest in the arts, but he understood her passion once she started teaching, sharing her knowledge and interest with others. Her mother, who was a hobby enamelist, taught her that it was okay to work with her hands, and relates that her first connection to metal was seeing all of her mother's copper butterflies and seahorses awaiting the enameling kiln. The familial influence may go even deeper, as her paternal grandfather, Louis Schildcrout, a Russian emigrant, worked as an ironworker in New York, helping to make footbridges in Central Park. Though she did not know him, she smiles and muses, "I like to think there's something in the genetics." Her seamstress grandmother, Dora Kaplan, visited her twice a year from New York with a box of clothes ready for final fitting. Gold explains, "I remember being in junior high (and junior high girls are so fussy!) and I'd whine, 'Oh, it puckers here!', and she'd say in Yiddish… basically, 'You're not a mannequin, you move. You move!' " Though probably not satisfied with the explanation as a teenager, this bit of wisdom became important to Gold as an adult. She incorporates movement in her jewelry and likes the way it interacts with an active body: "When you move things will change, and I took her words to heart." Gold attended Indiana University, intending to study social work (and received an undergraduate degree in psychology), but, after taking a summer off to study art in Mexico, she found her way to the university's fine arts department. She stayed in Bloomington and received her master's degree in jewelry design and silversmithing in 1975. She acknowledges that the program had a reputation for being very dogmatic at the time, and that Alma Eikerman (a renowned silversmith and educator) had a strong personality. But Gold has a deep admiration and affection for Eikerman, describing her as "one of the most important people who shaped my career, and maybe my life, too." Gold appreciated Eikerman's involvement in the studio and enjoyed learning about her international travels and historical research. The program's emphasis on design was particularly influential, and design remains Gold's primary concern regardless of what she is making: "Good design is good design." Gold quickly discovered that she enjoys teaching and the positive social interactions it involves; in fact, she considers it an essential part of her practice and does not like to be away from the classroom for too long. She believes that "people need people; you need that stimulation." She taught jewelry and metalsmithing at East Tennessee State University from 1975-1978 and at Illinois State University from 1978-1983. Now she teaches part-time at the Art Institute of Atlanta and at Chastain Arts Center, a community arts center near her home. Of her students at Chastain she happily notes, "You don't know who's going to walk into your class. You don't know why they are going to be there."