Quoil | Victoria McIntosh

Victoria McIntosh

I graduated from Otago Polytechnic School of Art in 1991 and again in 2005 this time majoring in Jewellery and Metalsmithing. Between times I have worked at a bookbinder, barmaid and picture framer, in a variety of cities around the world.

A collector and hoarder by nature, I have always been drawn to objects that carry a sense of history. Dunedin’s second hand shops provide rich hunting grounds for overlooked treasure and these finds form the basis for much of my work.

Tucked away in my studio I bring together the skills I was taught as a child around the kitchen table with those later learnt at the jeweller’s bench.

Patty tin series

“I have always thought that there is no more fruitful source of family discontent that a wife’s badly cooked dinners and untidy ways”

Mrs Beeton’s book of cookery and house hold management was always within reach of my Grandmother's arm chair. A product of her generation my grandmother truly did believe a woman’s place was in the kitchen.

On hearing I was returning to Art school at the age of thirty, her concerned response was “you’ll never find a husband there”… and she was right, I didn’t….

I inherited many of her well worn and love utensils, though not the skill to use them. But as you can see from this current series of work I prefer to wear them.

VMI37. Vintage button Mother of Pearl ring $250