‘PMC Decade’

National Profile Art Jewelry Exhibition Open At Craft Center

BROOKFIELD — Precious Metal Clay is a manufactured material in which microscopic particles of silver, gold, or other precious metal are mixed with a moist binder and resembles modeling clay. It can be shaped and textured like clay (and then allowed to dry somewhat, also similar to the process of working with clay), and when heated to temperatures that approach the melting point of the metal particles, fuses to create a solid fine silver or gold object.

PMC is not a polymer clay. The material has to be fired at high temperatures (above 800° F) produced by a kiln or a torch, while polymer clay may be cured in a regular oven (requires 275° F).

 “It’s a clay that, after being fired, looks like [silver or gold, depending on its type],” Kristen Müller, the education director at Brookfield Craft Center, explained recently. An exhibition entitled “PMC Decade” has opened in the Lynn Tendler Bignell Gallery at Brookfield Craft Center (BCC), and will remain on view through March 16.

“In some cases you can’t even tell that it’s PMC,” Ms Muller continued during the exhibition’s opening reception earlier this month, “while others definitely show traits of PMC.”

The “secret ingredient,” the binding material that holds the material together while artists work with PMC prior to its firing, is methylcellulose.

“The secret is out,” said Linda Kaye-Moses, who offered remarks during the exhibition opening. “It’s actually a bookbinder’s glue, and a little bit of water.

“The particles are fine,” she continued. “They’re like talcum powder. When you’re done with the kiln, the binder has evaporated.”

PMC has been available in the United States for just over a decade. It was developed during the early 1990s in Japan when Dr Masaki Morikawa of Mitsubishi Materials Corporation led a team of scientists in developing and patenting the material. Pottery is an art form with deep cultural significant stretching back more than a millennium in Japan, and Dr Morikawa wanted to combine jewelry making with ceramics.

The BCC exhibition was curated by Tim McCreight of Cape Elizabeth, Maine, a nationally prominent metalsmith, teacher, and author. Mr McCreight was one of the first American jewelers to work directly with Dr Morikawa and his team once the scientists decided the product was ready for export.

The Mitsubishi team originally approached Darnall Burks, a Mitsubishi engineer who had been working with the company for several years. Mr Burks put the team in touch with Deer Isle, Maine, jeweler Ronald Hayes Pearson. Mr Pearson was reportedly intrigued by PMC but had recently retired from active studio work, so he put the PMC team in touch with fellow jeweler and teacher Mr McCreight, who worked with Mr Burks and Mr Pearson in creating an opportunity for 15 leaders in the crafts world to experiment with PMC in order to assess its value.

A “studio think tank” took place at Haystack Mountain School in Deer Isle in May 1995. According to the PMC Guild website (PMCGuild.com), the official online information source about the material, that think tank led to the discovery of some interesting facts about PMC. For one, it is “an amazingly plastic and versatile material.” PMC can be shaped by hand, folded, molded, extruded, and painted on another surface, reported the scientists and jewelers.

It can be endlessly textured and “takes on microscopically fine definition,” their report continued. It can be mixed with ceramic powders and oxides to assume new shades of color and a rougher texture.

PMC can also be fired with stones and ceramics, and glazed and enameled.

Finally, PMC fits a wide range of artistic visions, but not all. “It complements but does not displace traditional jewelry methods,” it was learned.

According to Mr McCreight: “The plasticity and immediacy of this material and process lends itself for very creative use of metals.”

Many of the points discovered during the May 1995 session can be seen in the collection on view at Brookfield Craft Center. More than 60 pieces of artist designed, handmade jewelry made from PMC are displayed.

Mr McCreight had planned on offering a curator’s talk on February 3, the afternoon the show celebrated its formal opening, but was unable to make the reception due to an emergency. Linda Kaye-Moses, who led one of the first classes in PMC just over ten years ago when PMC was introduced in this country, stepped in as the afternoon’s speaker.

John I. Russell, the executive director of Brookfield Craft Center, called the show “one of the most important in the center’s history.”

Prior to turning the floor over to Ms Kaye-Moses, Mr Russell addressed the work that went into the exhibition.

“The 60-plus pieces are each presented in a very secure way,” he said, referring to the placement of each earring, necklace, bracelet, brooch, vessel, box, and wall hanging. “It’s one of the most complication presentations we’ve done, yet it looks like it’s always been here.”

The exhibition offers the public the chance to view and admire the workmanship of the 32 artists represented, along with an education into the variability of PMC. For the artists, it is also a celebration of their joy in working with the revolutionary material.

“The varieties that you see here,” said Ms Kaye-Moses, indicating the works on view, “are pretty spectacular, especially when you think that this material has been available in the United States for just over ten years. It’s a beloved material. There are applications with this material that other materials just can’t touch.”

Jewelers and metalsmiths can market their finished pieces as pure gold or silver without being misleading, she said.

“The material, when finished, is pure silver,” she reiterated. Traditional sterling silver is an alloy of .925 parts silver, while PMC is an even purer form, .999 parts. “In this world, nothing is perfect,” she said with a laugh. “This is as close to pure silver as you’re going to get.”

The “PMC Decade” collection, which also was on display at the National Ornamental Metals Museum in Memphis, Tenn., features work by some of America’s most innovative metalsmiths. It showcases how the unique medium has evolved since its introduction into the jewelry world over a decade ago.

The exhibiting artists include Elizabeth R. Agte, Kathleen Browne, Nicole Bsullak, Robert Dancik, Chris Darway, Tonya Davidson, Kathleen Dustin, Robert Ebendorf, Celie Fago, Pattie Leota Genack, Margarite Parker Guggolz, Clair Holliday, Jennifer Kahn, Linda Kaye-Moses, Yasutaka Kita, Terry Kovalcik, Jeanette Landenwitch, Vera Lightstone, Wendy Wallin Mallinow, Tim McCreight, Eleanor Moty, Sharon Portelance, Tina Rath, Kelly Russell, Hattie Sanderson, Stephanie Schroeter Frymyer, Barbara Becker Simon, Ivy Solomon, Bianca Terranova, Ken Thibado, Gordon K. Uyehara, CeCe Wire and J. Fred Woell.

The gallery is within Brookfield Craft Center’s historic mill building on Route 25 (286 Whisconier Road) which is just east of the four corners intersection with Routes 7/202. The gallery is open daily and admission is always free. For further information call 775-4526 or visit BrookfieldCraftCenter.org.