Goldsmiths' Tools 1771

Curator: Robert Bénard's "Goldsmiths' Tools" presents an array of implements, a catalog of creation, really. What strikes you about it? Editor: The clinical precision is chilling. Each tool, numbered and categorized, feels…devoid of context, like instruments laid out for an autopsy. Curator: Perhaps, but think of the agency each tool represents. These aren't instruments of destruction, but of transformation. They shape raw material into objects of beauty and value. Editor: Value determined by societal structures. Who decides what is beautiful? And who benefits from the goldsmith's labor? We must examine the socio-economic implications inherent in craftsmanship. Curator: Of course, and yet the print itself holds beauty, in its stark simplicity, almost a silent celebration of the hand that holds each tool. Editor: A celebration that perhaps overlooks the hands that are exploited in the process. Something to consider. Curator: Indeed. A balance, as ever, between the ideal and the real. Editor: Precisely. And to be in pursuit of that ideal.