IDENTITIES AND SUBVERSIONS
Calling into play a maker, a wearer and a viewer, a piece of jewelry can have many different meanings depending on who wears it, where it is worn and in which historical period.
Although it has evolved into an object of self-expression by artists and designers in the 20th century, jewelry actually had its beginnings as a sign of gratitude and a codified expression of identity that revealed a society’s main roles and their transformations.
In the West, jewelry to this day is characterized as overtly feminine. “Associated with women’s bodies from childhood, it is supposed to discretely accentuate beauty and sensuality, exemplifying a form of pointless frivolity,” Dressen points out.
But as an enhancer of sensuality, it must follow certain rules of etiquette or risks becoming a symbol of immorality. Pearls, for example, have connotations of virginity, knowledge and hetero-normative femininity which the contemporary designer Manon van Kouswijk subverts with her necklace, “Pearls for Girls,” an homage to cabaret singer Suzie Solidor, the androgynous icon of ’20s Paris nightlife who was a self-proclaimed sexual predator.
The double necklace of ceramic beads deploys the traditional connotations of pearls together with the cross (normally for piety and morality) on behalf of lesbian love via a twinned symbol, both feminine and feminist, in effect “countering the male gaze to which the pearl necklace traditionally measures itself.”
As a prefiguration of “sexual deflowering” jewelry often links or binds a woman to the giver, assigning the body to a role in which seduction is central. A solitaire diamond engagement ring is a prelude to the consummation in the conjugal bed.
To guarantee this bond, the chastity belt with a lock was even created as an assurance that the bride remains chaste when the groom was not around.
Jewelry, however, was not always “feminine.” Like clothing, it was an essential attribute of masculine power before the Industrial Revolution. Its size and rarity served to make manifest one’s superiority over others, as in the case of chieftains and kings.
A towering gold conical hat from the Bronze Age has symbols used to make astronomical predictions that would help with agricultural and other important decisions. It no doubt inspired awe, signified authority and commanded submission. Louis XV was known to have wanted only the biggest and finest diamonds for jewelry that he commissioned, affirming his divine right to rule.
A huge armband of diamonds by Cartier is just one of the many pieces that the maharajahs of India would pile on from head to toe to as symbols of sovereignty over their subjects.
Today, only discreet, mostly functional pieces of jewelry are acceptable for men, like cufflinks, a wedding band and a wristwatch — a bias that distinguishes the active, serious man from the frivolous, vain woman. Of course there are exceptions, like hip-hop rappers, goths, punks and dandies who are rebels against the established order.
This “dominant” form of adornment is also not just within the purview of men, with femmes fatales and women of power piling on the big rocks as well. María Félix, a Mexican actress commissioned a huge, spectacular serpent necklace from Cartier, reflecting a new generation of women who were strong and exuded a certain virility. Whereas the traditional clichés of femininity were that of being fatal and venomous like serpents, the new woman is “dangerously independent, her provocative jewels an emblem of her transformation.”