Jewellery

Human beings evolved as permanent bipeds, with the result that our feet and
hands acquired different functions : our feet provide stability and locomotion,
while our hands have specialised in the playful and practical manipulation of
materials and tools (Warnier 1999). One can argue that the need for equipment
(i.e. any object required by an individual for a specific activity) arose from this
unique evolution. Personal equipment is a functional, sensory and communicative
extension used for the performance of self in contemporary society. The
research project Equipbody places the body at the centre of this relationship. The
intimacy of this link directly influences the body, its posture and movements. The
project includes field research on shoes and jewellery, purposely non-connected
equipment. Historically, major innovations in the field of dress and accessories
came through new uses and perceptions of the body rather than from innovative
objects (Farren & Hutchinson 2004).
Today, both the younger and the older generations have wholly adopted
the culture of equipment in dress, accessories and indispensable electronic devices.
The latter have become vital to the «supermodern» human being, always
on the move, always connected, surrounded with an overabundance of space
and information (Augé 1992). Mobile devices are an extension of their owner’s
identity, kept permanently close at hand. They are the depository of our social
selves, harbouring all our contacts, pictures, messages and personal timelines.
The day’s outfit is paired with fine white cables that link earpieces to portable
electronic products and have become the universal 21st century necklace.
Equipbody starts by reviewing how, in a supermodern context dominated
by a fascination for performance and connected technology, our bodies are
perceived as inadequate. They need to be enhanced so we can live longer, stay
young, tolerate city life and strenuous working hours, win sports competitions,
cross time zones and explore the universe. Our self has become ubiquitous, our
body remaining in one place, while our spirit is transported elsewhere by the
miracle of technology. However, since we spend most of our time in a seated
position, we have in effect become sedentary beings. Furthermore, our fashion
culture imposes an idealised and increasingly disembodied vision of the self,
fragmented among the myriad of screens that surround us. Though a large part
of our world now occupies a virtual and immaterial dimension, we are still material
girls and boys, dependent on accessories, primarily situated on our bodies.
Personal equipment has become essential in order to overcome our bodily
failings. Equipbody develops the hypothesis that accessories have now taken
precedence over the supermodern body.