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Creative Reinventions and Alternatives to Gold
In West Africa wearing gold, a scarce and valuable material, demonstrates power and prestige, taste and fashionability. Gold jewelry was often melted down and repurposed to keep pace with the current fashions or sold in times of economic hardship and financial need, functioning something like a mobile savings account. This means that jewelry dated before the mid-20th century is rare. Yet, we can still see the tremendous creativity that took place over just the past century.
Women of lesser means could also show off their fashion sensibility by wearing straw, plaster, or thread-wrapped jewelry. Such alternative materials and methods may predate or mimic the use of gold. In this transposition of material, an ornament once forged in costly metal is cast in more affordable mediums, demonstrating gold's widespread popularity. |