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Dutch art gallery owner Marie-José van den Hout is describing how the jeweller Dorothea Prühl wields her axe. She brings it down to precisely cut just the right amount of wood to create one of her neckpieces inspired by the natural world, the end result resembling a flock of birds encircling the neck. Up to 100 efforts may be rejected before Prühl is happy with the result, in particular how it sits on the body. Van den Hout says that she still gets a feeling of excitement in her stomach when she gets a new piece from Prühl.
Van den Hout is speaking from her home in the city of Nijmegen, the oldest in the Netherlands, a few kilometres from the German border. She lives above the “shop”, the culmination of more than 40 years of work that has resulted in the largest gallery of contemporary art jewellery in the world, Galerie Marzee (Marzee is a portmanteau of Marie-José’s name coined when she was a child).
It is obvious in the way that she talks about Prühl that, even at the age of 83, van den Hout’s enthusiasm and passion for what she does is undimmed. It also hints at the importance of the relationships between gallerist and artist that have helped her build the reputation of Galerie Marzee over the years and to represent some of the finest makers. (Prühl is considered by many as “the queen” of contemporary art jewellery.)
The gallery is housed in an old granary that dates back to the 17th century. When van den Hout took over what was then a ruin in the 1990s, she embarked on a restoration project that saw a 7-metre-high glass frontage added, an iron staircase constructed through its centre and high windows replacing the shutters at the back to give a view across the river Waal. The result is an impressive four-storey structure with 850 sq metres of exhibition space.
But this is no static museum to art jewellery, it is an energetic, dynamic space that mounts four to five temporary exhibitions every two months and is one of the most significant supporters of new talent, with its annual exhibition showcasing the best graduates from the top jewellery degree courses from around the world.
Some of those graduates will have found their work bought by the gallery for its collection of now more than 2,000 pieces acquired since 1979 that form its archive. This includes work by some of the most influential jewellery artists of the late 20th century, as well as pieces by new young makers.
“I can wear things from this collection, but I hardly ever do, because I like this one,” van den Hout says. She gently puts her hand on the gold necklace she is wearing, two “strands” of connected rectangular sections, some with a tint of coloured pigment, geometric and delicate. “I’m always wearing this necklace, I call it my pearls. I’ve had it I think for 15, 16 years.”
Its maker is Annelies Plantiejdt, who has received many awards, including the Marzee Prize in 2004. Her work is also in private and public collections around the world, including the Victoria and Albert Museum in London.
Another jewellery artist represented by the gallery is Jonathan Boyd, who is also head of applied art at the Royal College of Art in London. “Despite its massive space and reputation there is an incredible feeling of closeness and community when you visit [Galerie Marzee],” he says. “I think this is beautifully represented in the way they foster the development of artists in the community. They showcase artists from the past 50 years but also actively promote new makers and jewellers . . . creating this wonderful sense of tradition alongside the new.
“I have been really lucky that Marzee has shown my work in both group and solo exhibitions, and I was fortunate to be selected for the student exhibition. I remember being amazed by the scope of the work on display. I was both intimidated and excited by it all. It was the first time I had shown my work outside of the UK. Marie-José’s dedication to supporting new artists is so brilliant, and now, every year, I have my own students selected to take part in their graduate show and there is beautiful circularity to it all.”
Van den Hout has her own very particular criteria for selecting the work of jewellers who she is considering representing. Much of it is informed by her own upbringing — she comes from three generations of gold and silversmiths, mostly of ecclesiastical objects. She herself trained as a gold and silversmith but then turned to painting and sculpture.
Her guiding principles when selecting jewellery are what she describes as the “three Hs — head, hand and heart”. Head refers to having a good concept. The hand to the importance of being well made. Heart refers to the jeweller’s intentions. At the core is her understanding of the process. “I have been a maker,” she says. “I have grown up in a family of makers. I want things to be done very well.”
Of course as a gallery she needs to sell, too. Some of her most important clients are collectors from the US. “Americans are very good collectors,” she says. “They want to know everything about the pieces. They really want to know the why and the how, and so on.”
The tax breaks for American collectors also have a knock-on benefit for the dissemination and preservation of contemporary art jewellery. “Collecting is also good for their taxes and is the way that [American] museums get fantastic collections.”
Susan Cummins is a US collector of art jewellery who has a close relationship with Galerie Marzee and van den Hout. “I admire Marie-José so much that I decided to help produce a book about her, the gallery and the Marzee collection,” says Cummins.
The book will be published by Arnoldsche later this year. “Marie-José is filled with ideas. She is always hatching new plans for a show or how the work should be presented or any number of other things.”
Cummins praises the scale of ambition and dedication of Galerie Marzee including its annual graduate exhibition, which she says is hugely important for budding artists.
“From the beginning, the gallery has collected work from all its shows. The collection is actually a historical record of what they have shown over the years. What other gallery had the bright idea to do that and actually did it? No one.”
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