New dimensions

Torcs are among the earliest transcultural jewellery types. In multiple ways they have been vehicles for expressing goldsmithing skills since time immemorial and have transmitted cultural, social or political messages, often tied into ritual acts.

In the context of the redefined relationship between jewellery and the body, British jewellery designers David Watkins (b. 1940) and Wendy Ramshaw (1939–2018) took up the torc, reinterpreted it as a jewellery form that invaded the surrounding space and established it as a means of artistic expression in modern jewellery design. The artist couple, who met in 1961 as students at the University of Reading in England, would continue to collaborate on many projects but were also very successful independently of each other.

Whereas David Watkins pursued experimental approaches and was mainly interested in working with unconventional materials, the distinguishing features of Wendy Ramshaw’s works were geometric forms as well as textural and colour contrasts. In their own distinctive ways, both of them enlarged the prevailing canon of traditional jewellery design and opened up new ways for coming generations too.