Our Story
BIOGRAPHY
Sarah Holden is a contemporary jeweler and sculptor. Sarah received her Master of Fine Arts with a focus in Jewelry and Metalsmithing from the University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee and her Bachelor of Fine Arts in Crafts Materials Studies and Sculpture from Virginia Commonwealth University. Sarah has presented as a visiting artist at The School of the Art Institute in Chicago, The University of Wisconsin-Whitewater, The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and has taught as a Metals Instructor at The Penland School of Crafts in North Carolina. Sarah’s work can be found in the permanent collections of the Mint Museum in North Carolina and the Racine Art Museum in Wisconsin. Sarah has been recently honored with an Illinois Arts Council Individual Artist Grant and a Society of North American Goldsmiths Professional Educational Endowment. Sarah currently teaches steel fabrication, welding and metal forming at The Chicago Industrial Arts and Design Center in Chicago, Illinois. Sarah’s limited production jewelry and sculpture can be found in galleries across America. Sarah lives in Chicago where she works as a studio artist, metals instructor and mom.
STATEMENT
My work investigates how female identity is constructed and performed through the body. What is worn on the body, the shape of the body, the color of the body. The female body is site and content for my work and yields series in sculpture, drawing and limited-production jewelry. I source and celebrate imagery and histories of women that rebel against cultural expectation of the submissive female. Working inside this contested space I use traditional and non-traditional craft techniques to challenge these expectations by creating a role reversal through material.
ABOUT ME
I grew up in the Virginia, Maryland, Washington DC area. My Mom’s side of the family is from Virginia, my Dad’s side from Maryland. My parents are absolutely makers! I learned how to frame a house and hang drywall from my Dad and how to sew, crochet, knit and quilt from my Mom. They always considered their skills more hobby than profession. I knew that I wanted to go to art school and was determined to learn how artists can both make art well and support themselves. I was the first in my family to go to college and I took it very seriously. I was so excited when I finally started the arts program at VCU. I was lucky to study with Susie Ganch, Arthur Hash, Natalya Pinchuk and Sonya Clark. While I was in Richmond, I learned how to fabricate small non-ferrous objects and jewelry in copper, brass and silver in the Crafts Materials Studies department at VCU. When I was in my senior year, I received a Virginia Museum of Fine Arts Fellowship to study fabricating in GOLD! I stumbled a lot but it was so sweet to get to use this super precious material and discover how different it was from the other metals that I had been working in. At the same time that I was fabricating in copper, brass, silver and gold up in the jewelry department, I was also welding larger steel sculptures and had started wearing and performing my work down in the Sculpture department. I am fascinated by metal and how each metal can be so different.
Right after my undergraduate program in Richmond, Virginia I moved to Milwaukee, Wisconsin and began my graduate program with Yevgeniya Kaganovich and Frankie Flood at the University of Wisconsin Milwaukee. I was the very first metals graduate student with Yevgeniya! We built out the entire Graduate Metalsmithing studio and I learned so much about how to set up a studio. I spent most of my time in my graduate program making sculpture and performance art. This was also an important time where I learned a lot about the history of feminism. I also taught intro to metalsmithing classes and learned for the first time how to work with students. Moving to Milwaukee was a big change for me, I had never lived away from the east coast. It took me quite a while to get used to it and when I graduated my husband and I moved to Chicago for what we thought would be, only a few years. Fifteen years later we are still here and wouldn’t want to ever live anywhere else!
In the fifteen years that I have lived in Chicago, I have learned a lot about how to make jewelry, connect with customers, work with galleries and build connections with my community. I don’t think that I would want to do it anywhere else.
ABOUT US
Holden Metalsmithing Company is my jewelry fabrication and sculpture business. Our goal is to create bold, statement jewelry for bold wearers. I pride myself of making quality well-made jewelry that is unlike anything else on the market and makes people stop in the street to ask you where you got what you are wearing.
Sarah Holden is the designer and lead fabricator of the jewelry and objects made here. However, it is my goal to support other women and femmes in the process of my business running. Whenever possible, I employ female identifying assistants to help in the completion of my production jewelry and my artwork. I believe it’s important to hire promising junior metalsmiths in order to share the knowledge of technical skill, gallery representation and the successes and failures that I have experienced in the 15 years that I have been making jewelry. I often learn a lot from the younger generation too. This is how our institutional knowledge remains and grows in the future.