top of page

Torque necklace with mobiles of 2 pebbles, convertible into a mobile with 1 pebble, first grade silver and pebbles, unique piece made by the artist in Biot, circa 1950-60

 

Bibliography:

- Very close model reproduced in the book, Modern Scandinavian Design, Charlotte Fiell, Peter Fiell and Magnus Englund, Éditions Laurence King Publishing, page 519

 

Vivianna Torun Bülow-Hübe (1927-2004), famous under the name Torun, remains to this day one of the most important Scandinavian goldsmiths of the 20th century and a Swedish master jeweler, also the first woman to have acquired international fame in this job. She opened her workshop in Stockholm from 1951 to 1956, then at the end of the 1950s, she moved to Paris and the south of France, particularly in Biot, where she met Picasso, like him, collecting pebbles from a beach for making jewelry. In 1960, aged around thirty, she received the gold medal at the Milan Triennale and won the American Lunning Prize for design.

In 1969, she met the Danish goldsmith Georg Jensen for whom she began to design in 1969. This very delicate and sensual wrist ring, designed in 1970 as an untied vine ending in pearls set like stones, illustrates their collaboration.

Leader of this movement that started in Scandinavia, Viviana Torun asserts herself as a pioneer, whose artistic imprint profoundly renewed the style and language of contemporary jewelry after the Second World War. All of her work refers to movement, that of the goldsmith's gestures, that of forests or water, dear to her Nordic culture, which she translates into spirals and silver rings with infinite variations. She brought silver and so-called poor stones into fashion by giving them the power of form, and a subtle and non-ostentatious luxury, that of the refinement of details. Her jewelry was worn by the biggest international stars of the time: Billie Holiday, Ingrid Bergman and Brigitte Bardot.

Numerous international retrospectives have been devoted to her since the 1960s, where she enjoyed great commercial success and esteem. His works are today present in the largest museums: Museum of Decorative Arts in Paris, Museums of Fine Arts in Stockholm, Malmö Museum, Röhsska Museum in Gothenburg, Kunstindustrimuseum in Oslo and Copenhagen.

 

Vivianna Torun Bülow-Hübe, mobile pebble necklace

    bottom of page