Charity Hall

Bio

Charity Hall is an enamelist and metalsmith. A former botanist, she is interested in the intricate relationships between art and science. Using metal, enamel, found objects and gemstones, she creates a diverse array of biologically inspired jewelry. From a B.A. in Biology at Colorado College in 2000, she went on to an MFA in Metal Design at East Carolina University in 2008, and taught Metalworking and Design at Pima Community College for five years. In 2013, she moved to Blacksburg, VA to begin a full time studio practice. The allure of science remains strong, influencing every piece she creates, and she still roams the forests and mountains, collecting specimens for natural history museums. Her work appears in Behind the Brooch, Humor in Craft, New Rings: 500 Designs from Around the World, and 500 Enameled Objects, and she is a contributing author for Art Jewelry Magazine. Her work has been exhibited in a variety of juried and solo exhibitions. She teaches jewelry and enameling workshops at the Idyllwild Arts Academy, Penland School of Crafts, the Center for Enamel Art, and many other universities and guilds around the United States.

Statement

My metalwork and enameling explore entomological life. Whether dissected, manipulated, or scrutinized, these organisms remain elusive and woefully unappreciated. Our anthropomorphic bias focuses only on the exasperations they create specific to the human condition—the bloodthirsty mosquito, stinging wasp, or menacing cockroach lurking beneath the stove. Ready to smack, squish, and spray, we fail to appreciate the evolutionary aptitude and infinitely varied anatomical brilliance of these savage bugs. Despite our cultural aversions, irrespective of the blindness of human perception, insects are the successful progeny of millions of years of evolution and will continue to flourish or perish, long surpassing our own evolutionary blip. Their genius reveals itself from intricate venation patterns within glassy wings to microscopically formidable tarsi, and in an abundance of complex microcosms of line, form, and texture—all of which inspire me. Perhaps the real aggravation then is not the pesky mosquito to the human, but the human as the ephemeral vexation in the eternal reign of the insects.