An exhibition like no other

IN AUTUMN 1961, THE DOORS OF GOLDSMITHS’ HALL opened for an exhibition like no other. This, according to the late Graham Hughes, Art Director of the Goldsmiths’ Company and curator of the show, was to be ‘an art exhibition of a high order, intended to raise the standing of jewellery so that it becomes a valid interest both for discerning patrons and, as during the Renaissance, for leading artists of all sorts’. It was the ‘world’s first comprehensive show of modern jewels, tracing the evolution of its design in a field hardly covered by any textbook or exhibition’. Importantly, this exhibition not only looked to inspire and educate its audience, but aspired to act as a catalyst in which to stimulate the post-war jewellery industry here in the UK. The exhibition in question was the now seminal International Exhibition of Modern Jewellery 1890 –1961.