Manon van Kouswijk is interested in the universal qualities of jewellery and other personal objects, the value and meaning they represent and the different roles they have in exchanges between people as gifts, souvenirs, heirlooms. In her work she makes aspects of the way we use and handle things visible in the objects themselves. Her working methods are quite elaborate and obsessive, ranging from making pearlchains of paper archive stickers on a thread and cutting butterflies out of mass-produced domestic objects to embroidering stains on table cloths. Subject matter and type of object usually define the chosen material and technique.