Movements in Metal: Jewelry Maker Anne Dahl on Sustainability and How Sculpting and Sound Influence her Work

“I generally don’t draw out designs and stick to a plan,” says Anne Dahl, an Ottawa-based jewelry maker and metalsmith whose background in painting, music, and sculpting impacts her process.

“My work with jewelry always ran parallel to the study of sound. I have years of field recordings from life and the industrial noise of my jewelry studio.”

The way she fell into jewelry making is not unlike her approach to design. Anne was a year into painting at the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design and had apprenticed with a stone sculptor in Germany when a friend asked if she wanted to join her in Indonesia to work and learn from local silversmiths. She jumped at an opportunity to travel but it didn’t take long for her to fall in love with the medium. 

“The work was so tedious, strenuous, and dirty. I really felt captured by the miraculous transformation metal makes when worked and polished.”

She soon switched to a double major in Jewelry Design/Metalsmithing and Intermedia, where jewelry-making became her main focus, along with media arts - but she hasn’t left sculpting behind. 

“I think jewelry has been a very long detour back to sculpture. When I was first introduced to sculpture I didn’t understand it. It was daunting, large, and abstract and I think I was afraid to take up space with something of a certain scale or with something that people didn’t understand. I have a completely different understanding of sculpture now.”

At the end of the day, both sculpting and jewelry making are about interaction with the human body. “The design process is ultimately informed on what or who I’m designing for. For my own pieces, I may have a vague idea of shape or flow or feeling but I sit with wax and metal and play until something excites me.” 

You can see the influences in the unique texture of her pieces. “For my more commercial jewelry, it’s form, movement, and ‘stare-ability’. I love an abstract ring I can get lost in - an organic flowing metal that looks like water. In sculpture, it’s ephemerality, touch, interaction, and sound.”

Anne also takes inspiration from artists including Tehching Hsieh, Nam June Paik and Sophie Calle,  jewelry makers pushing beyond traditional pieces and from the process itself. 

 “I think that’s what it is - a shape or finish or movement that makes me think “mmm that’s good” or “that’s weird - I love it.”

Now a few years into creating jewelry and learning lessons on the way, Anne is further playing around with the pieces she creates including the metals she uses. 

“Evolution has been very, very slow, sometimes dormant; a series of stops and starts. I’m moving towards a balance of a small collection of production jewelry balanced by installations for work of the body in gallery settings.”

Time, resources, and experience have given her the chance to explore her approach to jewelry making. “I used what I could barely afford at the time and made things I thought people might like. It never really gained momentum because I was broke, and in debt, and burnt out. It was really difficult to buy the tools I needed to make the jewelry I wanted. I also was more in love with sounds and performance but didn’t yet understand how or why I could make the marriage between the two.”

The evolution in her work also includes the metals she uses. “My go-to metal is silver. It’s more accessible at a lower price point and the look is soft and industrial. I love the way it wears - like a good pair of denim.” 

This doesn’t mean she’s shying away from gold - “The first time I worked with gold I had a grand ‘aha’ moment. I hadn’t understood the fuss before, as I couldn’t afford to work with it, but it’s a beautiful metal to work with. Its characteristics are so charming and unique to itself. Now I love gold. I wear a mix depending on my mood.” 

She’s not just sticking to traditional metals either. “I’m also working on a small series of rings that incorporates a collection of my bar of soap ends that I’ve saved over the past couple of years. I’m planning some large-scale sculptures and on the side of all of that I’m working on an even larger, slower body of work —more of a ‘life’s work’— and making everything in my house — from shelves to couches, cutlery, door knobs, and eyeglasses.” 

Sustainability is an underlying theme across all her creations. “I try to take responsibility for what I make, including thoughtful and conscious decisions on local labour, small scale production, using recycled and secondary mined metals, recycled packaging, donating portions of profits towards local vulnerable communities, and by trying to be better each year.”

As she says, “when we take from the earth we need to give back, but we also need to defend, uplift, listen, and support those on the front lines - specifically Indigenous communities in Turtle Island and abroad that have been stewarding and protecting this land for centuries.”

Anne’s goals include an eventual off-grid workspace and only using 100 per cent recycled metal for her pieces. “I think there are deep and devastating flaws in mining and the exploitation surrounding the sale of 'valuable' material. But I do my best to navigate that.”

As she continues to work towards this, Anne says “gallery work is my goal for this next chapter. I’m focusing on grant writing and the creation and development of my practice.” 

You can expect to see more of Anne’s blend of influences - metal, sound and sculpture in her new venture, along with continued commitment to sustainability. 

“I do what I can with what I’ve got.”

Check out  Anne Dahl’s work on her website and follow along on  Instagram to see what she’s up to next.