Art-jewellery cannot be completely free of context.  Every material or process has an embedded material cultural history.  The goldsmith has an inescapable history but this is not a burden, conundrum or impediment to make an original statement.  New contexts can be invented and illustrated with fictitious evidence.  Historic or contemporary contexts of the human drama is available to be subverted using the jewellery artifact to convey contextual meanings.  Jewellery is the vehicle.

Living Treasure: Master of Australian Craft, goldsmith and emeritus professor at RMIT University, Robert Baines has maintained a national and international profile with exhibitions, awards, lectures and publications for more than forty years.  His works are in prestigious public collections in Great Britain, Germany, France, USA, New Zealand, and Australia.  In the research areas of artist goldsmithing and archaeometallurgy he received a Winston Churchill Study grant in1979 and this was followed by Senior Fulbright and two Senior Andrew Mellon Conservation Fellowships at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in NY.  In Germany he has received the Friedrich Becker Preis, Bayerischer Staatspreis and Herbert Hofmann Preis.  Most recent books published are Bracelet-Java-la-Grande (2006) and More Amazing Schmuck Stories by Robert Baines (2009) and Fabulous Follies Frauds and Fakes (2013).