Dutch jewellery and product designer Gijs Bakker (b. 1942) has been a prominent figure in international jewellery for over forty years. He has been setting trends in both form and design since the 1960s. Bakker and his wife Emmy van Leersum are credited with the supreme achievement of having elevated jewellery to a cutting-edge art form in its own right, and sparking off the development of avant-garde art jewellery in Europe and the U.S. This book is the long awaited complete works of Gijs Bakker's jewellery in a catalogue raisonn,. Knowledgeable and entertaining essays by the art historian Ida van Zijl, and beautiful colour illustrations in large formats trace developments over nearly fifty years in the stunning oeuvre of this internationally acclaimed artist. The book also contains detailed descriptions of the work he has done to the present day, as well as a comprehensive biography and complete bibliography.

Gijs Bakker and Jewelry Ida van Zijl

 Introduction 18

 1 Background and Training

 2 The Liberating Form: work from the period 1963-1973

 3 'The Medium is the Message': work from the period 1976-1983

 4 GIJS+EMMY

 5 Reconciliation and Virtuosity: work from 1985 to the present

 6 '1 think, act and live through my jewelry': the significance of jewelry in Bakker's work

 7 'They are artists, not designers...': the international significance of Bakker's jewelry

Literature

Selected works

Oeuvre catalogue

Catalogue notes Marte Rodenburg

Selected biography and bibliography Wil van Gils

General index

Design index