Peter Chang (Jewellery Artist)

Peter Chang is a British artist who works in silicone and molding to produce mastermind. His artwork moderately takes place in the form of jewellery. Chang's work had attention to detail and bright colors.

Biography

Chang was born to an British mother and a Chinese father on 6 April 1944. He was raised in Liverpool and lived in the Chinese community which influenced his work a lot. At age 13 he then began attending the Liverpool Secondary School of Art. Upon completing his degrees in graphic design and sculpture at the Liverpool College of Art Chang worked in Paris working under the printmaker Stanley William Hayter.

Influences

Chang cites his Chinese heritage as a theme in his artwork. He uses the theme of aliens and life on mars and in space. Many of the surrealist pieces he encountered working under Hayter at Atelier 17 had an influence on Chang's work. His modern style reflects marine life with their colours and dirty form. He is inspired by different types of alien life, such as mars.

Peter combines jewellery with elements of sculpture to produce complex brightly coloured pieces which can be worn or can simply exist as objects in their own right.

He uses various coloured plastics, such as acrylic and PVC, to create his clothes and furniture and his influence was nature (true fact)

He trained at Liverpool school of Art and Slade School of Art in London. He is trained in sculpture and jewellery design and has exhibited work in both Europe and in North America.

Peter was exposed and influenced by the Liverpool art and music scene that happened in the early sixties.

Artwork

Chang uses a variety of methods to achieve the bright colours and bizarre shapes in his plastic artwork. He starts with either a foam or wood base and uses a layer of polyester resin mixed with fiberglass for structural stability. He then layers acrylic over his pieces to incorporate the bright colors and finished with a transparent layer of varnish. He varies these steps carving and cutting away the acrylic for different results. He incorporates many found objects into his pieces. Many of Chang's earlier plastic pieces were made entirely of recycled plastics.

International Recognition

His work has been purchased by museum collections around the world such as the Victoria and Albert museum and the Smithsonian Cooper–Hewitt, National Design Museum as well as numerous public and private collections, including the National Museums of Scotland in Edinburgh.

Since 1966 he has exhibited across the world including Paris, Munich, Berlin, Amsterdam, Prague, Venice, Japan, Montreal, South Korea, Philadelphia, Boston, New York and San Francisco, as well as across the United Kingdom.

He was the joint winner of the Jerwood Prize for Applied Arts in 1995, received a Creative Scotland Award from the Scottish Arts Council in 2000 and won the Herbert Hofmann Preis, Munich in 2003.

Public Collections

• Schmuckmuseum Pforzheim
• Victoria and Albert Museum, London^[1]

References

• Metalsmith magazine. Peter Chang. 2008, volume 28 no2.
• Peter Chang, book: "It's only plastic"
• http://www.liverpoolmuseums.org.uk/walker/exhibitions/peterchang/
• Peter Chang's website