Date of Award
Spring 5-31-2025
Document Type
Thesis
Degree Name
Master of Fine Arts (MFA)
Department
Jewelry and Metalsmithing
First Advisor
Seth Papac
Second Advisor
Lauren Fensterstock
Third Advisor
Klaus Burgel
Abstract
Bodily experiences with stones can produce an experience of the sublime. Through the act of traversing a stone, we can reorient our sense of scale and situatedness in nature. In this thesis, I invoke natural forces of great magnitude in an intimate context, making portable the expansion of thinking that occurs when we imagine ourselves on and as surfaces resembling landscapes.
I have developed my methodology through fieldwork in gorges, beaches and museums, culminating in a study of the conventions of Scholar’s stones and the aesthetics of the sublime. I define the sublime in historical and contemporary contexts by analysing artist examples and their effects.
As jewelry, my work exists in interpersonal contexts and extends the reach of sublimity through bodily engagement for wearers and viewers. This is essential to me as the sublime enables us to reflect on our place within our environment — physically, and meta-physically — altering our perception of self in regard to magnitudes of space and time. Re-orienting understandings of ourselves through somatic experiences of stone enables us to understand the influence we have on the world. In this research, I identify the sublime's impact on audiences and its potential to contribute to the future of the field of jewelry. Through these devices I seek to transcend the body-scale limits of jewelry and objects.
The sublime surrounds you and I.
Recommended Citation
Freeman, Matthew, "Moving with Mountains" (2025). Masters Theses. 1399.
https://digitalcommons.risd.edu/masterstheses/1399
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