Radiant Pavilion is a curated programme spanning six days with an aim to promote contemporary jewellery and object practice in Melbourne and around the world.

The event includes urban interventions, performances and installations, as well as exhibitions, talks and open studios featuring artists from the strong and even evolving community of artists and designers.

Three years since its inception, Radiant Pavillion has welcomed many national and international artists, offering them a new platform for presentation and networking as it attracts not only artists but theorists, collectors, wearers, and appreciators from Australia and around the world.

This year, the event welcomes eight creatives of Greek descent whose names are worth highlighting in the following exhibitions:

‘Time:Form’
Anastasia Kandaraki, Demitra Ryan-Thomloudis and Poly Nikolopoulou, alongside Christopher Earl Milbourne, Ruby Aitchison and Khyran Randall-Demllo present a selection of artists whose work examines and identifies aesthetic connections of the built and constructed environment, and considers how particular qualities might alter over time.

Kandaraki and Nikolopoulou were both born in Athens in the 1980s and studied art and jewellery design. Kandaraki moved on to creating her own contemporary jewellery label while Nikolopoulou co-founded Krama Institute, a contemporary jewellery school in Athens.​ American-born and based Thomloudis is an assistant professor and head of the Jewelry/Metals/Enameling programme at Kent State University and her work is featured in museums and various exhibitions around the world.

Anastasia Kandaraki

Demitra Ryan-Thomloudis

Poly Nikolopoulou

Where: Tinning Street Presents, Lot 5, 29 Tinning St, ​Brunswick
When: 21 August – 3 September, Tue – Sun 11.00 am – 5.00 pm.
Opening: Thursday 24 August, 6.00 – 9.00 pm

‘Utter Hero’
Acclaimed New Zealand contemporary jewellery designer Stella Chrysostomou together with Andrea Daly and Peter Deckers have created an ideas exchange project by building an intriguing jewelry installation for this venue exploring the process of jewellery-making. They use the book as a mode of transferring ideas, experiences and information from person to person whether it be themselves or the audience. Their goal is to create a dialogue through the ‘chatter’ that objects can create whilst challenging societal misconceptions.

Andrea Daly, Stella Chrysostomou, Peter Deckers, 2017, life-size, humans. Photo: Peter Deckers

Where: The Paperback Bookshop, 60 Bourke St, Melbourne
When: 26 August – 3 September, Mon – Thu 9.30 am – 10.00 pm, Sat 11.00 am – 11.00 pm, Sun 12.00 – 7.00pm

Reflector|Receptor: ‘Narratives of Experience’
An exhibition of contemporary jewellery by Melbourne-born and based artist Nicole Polentas, Narratives of Experience investigates multi-platform works that transmit the connection between life and death creating a narrative between the artist and the viewer, the reflector and the receptor. The exhibition seeks to examine the ways in which the crafted object can transform lived experience using interplay between the object and the viewer. Polentas recently curated the international Greek jewellery show titled ‘Unclasped’ at the Hellenic Museum in Melbourne and co-initiated the ‘Bluestonia 24/7: Local’ project as part of RMIT CAST research.

Reflector|Receptor by Nicole Polentas.

Where: ​Red Gallery, 157 St Georges Rd, North Fitzroy
When: 30 August – 17 September, ​Wed – Sun 10.00 am – 5.00 pm.
Opening: Wednesday 30 August, 6.00 – 8.00 pm

‘Memory + Assembly’
Jeweller and object maker Bianca Mavrick returns to her earliest memories of childhood, exploring the personal and collective migrant experiences of her Greek Italian family growing up in sub-tropical Queensland.

Bianca Mavrick, 2015, Fan Brush Earrings, 8 x 2cm, sterling silver, cold enamel, found brush, powder coat, brass, plastic, timber. Photo: Lisa Brown​

Mavrick is known for working across diverse colour and material palettes utilising her background in industrial design and fine art and for pushing the boundaries of production by opting for handmade techniques. Vivid colours are her calling card, expressed through tactile materials such as cold enamel, hand-turned and painted timber, sterling silver and precious stones.

Bianca Mavrick

Where: Craft Pop Up Store, Collins Place, 45 Collins St, ​Melbourne
When: 23 August – 23 September, Mon-Fri 11.00 am – 6.00 pm, Sat 10.00 am – 5.00 pm.
Opening: Saturday 26 August, 5.00 – 7.00 pm

‘NEO Cuts’
In ‘NEO Cuts’, Melanie Katsalidis explores the case for breaking the rules in lapidary. Travelling to the central Queensland sapphire gem fields, Lightning Ridge in New South Wales for black opal and to international locations for other fine gems, she has sourced rough to custom cut and found unusual cuts to set into a collection of one-off jewellery. These pieces offer a new appreciation of the creative potential of lapidary with fresh cuts and unique possibilities. Katsalidis is the director and founder of Pieces of Eight which she established in 2005 with studies in fine arts, gold and silversmithing. Her work is held in many private collections and is often commission based. She has exhibited widely, and in 2014 collaborated with Melbourne fashion label Alpha60 on an exhibition using Australian opals which culminated in an exhibition entitled ‘Upala’, and in 2016 collaborated with New York-based sculptor Phillip Low on ‘Chroma’.

Melanie Katsalidis, NEO Cuts, 2017, 100x80mm, sapphire, ametrine, aquamarine, tourmaline. Photo: Andrew Bachram

Where: Pieces of Eight, 28 Russell Pl, Melbourne. When: 31 August – 30 September, Fri-Sat 10am – 6pm, Sun 10am – 5pm.
Opening: Thursday 31 August, 6.00 – 8.00 pm

Talismans for Travel @ Adelphi Hotel
Talismans for Travel presents a collection of contemporary wearable objects that seeks to provide protection, luck and guidance – and celebrate the experience of travel and exploration. This exhibition focuses on the ways in which contemporary jewellery can give physical and artistic expression to the ubiquitous desire for safe passage and a sense of place, in the pursuit of new worlds.

Greek Australian jewellery designer Vikki Kassioras will be amongst those showcasing their work. The aesthetic qualities of Vikki’s pieces is inspired by archaeology, classical mythology and archetypal symbols that draw on her heritage and her beliefs. She often uses the ancient gold-working techniques of fusing and granulation. The uneven and textured surfaces of her pieces are the result of an array of processes, giving this contemporary jewellery the feeling of being a recently discovered artefact.

Other artists exhibiting are Amy Renshaw, Anita Crowther, Brad Bird, Cinnamon Lee, Courtney Jackson, Daniel Serra, Emma Jane Donald, Jose Marin, Julia deVille, Julia Storey, Laura Eyles, Liv Boyle, Mel Young, Natalia Milosz-Piekarska, Phoebe Porter and Sarah Heyward.

Vikki Kassioras loves making beautiful pieces of jewellery.

Where: Adelphi Hotel, 187 Flinders Ln, Melbourne
When: Now on until Saturday 2 September

To find out more, visit Radiant Pavilion’s website.