While in high school, Melissa Cameron made a brass ring in round wire. The join was impossible to find. Both technical precision and precociousness remain trademarks of her work. Melissa began her creative career in interior, signage and industrial design. She has since studied and honed her contemporary jewellery craft in Australia and abroad and in 2011 completed a term as artist-in-residence at the University of West England in Bristol. Over this time, the technical and conceptual considerations at play in her work have become serenely connected.
Melissa’s pieces are carefully designed in AutoCAD, inspired by the mathematical precision of geometric formulae as well the as ostensibly random fractal patterns found in nature. This conscious comparison speaks of Melissa’s belief that the world is a series of interconnected and self-similar patterns. Sawn shapes formed of diverse materials, from sandblasted sheet metal through to recycled bamboo, are strung together and made three-dimensional through the tension of steel cable that connects layers. Her pieces are formed of patterns, which are challenging to comprehend in a single glance. Instead, viewers and wearers must let their eye take a journey through a piece, discovering that hidden in a seemingly simple pattern is a wealth of complexity…a lot like life, really.
“First, I draw patterns on my computer. I have many, many patterns; it’s a continual drawing process. Not until I string the piece do I know how big it is. It’s like an architectural plan, with sections or elevations. I just have to work with the plan and make it into something that I enjoy.”
