Brisbane based jeweler, Leigh Wagner, has been working across art, jewelry and digital image making for three decades, with these disciplines informing each other. Her practice aims to explore the minute objects of contemporary society in order to interrogate our broader attitudes, habits, histories and future prospects.
Wagner’s series Breastplates for the digitally inclined are made from scavenged materials including recycled acrylic, silk scarf string and sterling silver. Playing on a contrast between the ethnographic associations of breastplates, and the cyber language she uses within them, Wagner’s works allude to a post-apocalyptic world resulting from the activities of our “digital tribe”. Intricately cut and formed, the decorative breastplates deliver a warning, and imply some alternate meanings for “delete” and “escape” in the real rather than virtual world.