The Jewelry at TEFAF
While art is the main attraction at the tony fair, several jewelry exhibitors put on a impressive show.
Each year, TEFAF takes over the Park Avenue Armory, drawing blue-chip art galleries from around the world and becoming a stage for art-world theatre. Elaborate floral displays line the walls and globes of yellow, green, and purple flowers are suspended from the Armory’s dark cavernous ceiling. Inside the booths, you come across works from art heavyweights, such as Joan Miró, Willem De Kooning, Alexander Calder, and Yayoi Kusama. Visitors in need of a reprieve can sip on champagne at an oyster bar or nosh on a Bemelmans-esque trio of snacks while overlooking a grid of stark white-walled booths. A crowd of Upper East Side women in their 70s wearing Gucci loafers brush past aspiring Gen Z TikTok influencers. A young woman asked me to take a video of her posing on the balcony because her “makeup matched the flower display.” (I reluctantly obliged.) Serious art collectors are welcomed warmly by gallerists and hold hushed conversations at the tables or in private corners of their booths.
But amidst the rows of coveted artworks, there are a handful of jewelry exhibitors. Most you can spot by the jewelry on display, of course, but more noticeably the security closely eyeing you. These booths tend to be quieter. A 6’5” security guard doesn’t scream “come on in.” Once I mustered the confidence to walk into Hemmerle, I found myself whispering as if in a library as I stepped in close to the displays. Among the collection was a trio of pieces set with deep green emeralds, and a pair of one-of-a-kind earrings featuring crimson-hued tourmalines embedded in a marbled, cloud-like patterning of mineral discs, each one enclosed in patinated copper.
At Ana Khouri’s booth, minimalist glass displays feature pieces by the designer, whose forms and unexpected materials come closest to sculpture. An amorphous-shaped necklace in 18k brown, white, and yellow gold with rock crystal and diamond is even more beautiful in person. Khouri also introduced a necklace and earrings with delicate tulips, composed of rock crystal and diamonds—the first time she has incorporated flower motifs into her work.
On the opposite end of the jewelry spectrum was Didier Ltd, the London-based dealers who specialize in 19th- and 20th-century jewelry by leading designers, architects, and artists. Unlike the other exhibitors, Didier’s booth packed its vitrines with photos of celebrated artists and the jewelry they created.
Each drawer revealed an artist’s oeuvre—only in miniature: There was Salvador Dalí’s gold and diamond leaf necklace, a simple brooch by Keith Haring of his signature figure on all fours, an array of brutalist-like pieces by Louise Nevelson, Harry Bertoia’s silver feathered-wing earrings, and Michelle Oka Doner’s silver Frond necklace, and more.
The owners took out additional pieces to show a collector, who said he once stayed at the artist’s studio. I did several loops around the intimate, yet lively space — no security guards keeping careful watch, no one seeming to notice how long I lingered on each piece.
Warhol watch pls
Didier has such cool pieces!