EXCESSORIES - let's talk about FAT

The jewellery exhibition and installation ‘Excessories - let’s talk about fat’ (Gallery Louise Smit, Amsterdam 2012) built on an on-going research enquiry undertaken in operation theatres in private clinics in Switzerland since 2009. Following the routines of a plastic aesthetic surgeon at work, this research identified new perspectives on the contemporary obsession with body modifications after observing the diverse fates of fat in the operation theatre. Body fat, when removed (using liposuction or surgery), or when newly distributed to other body parts (lipofilling), is protocolled in grams or cubic centimetres during each operation. These data offer tangible information. Excessories introduces the notion of excess (which lays at the etymological core of the word luxury) and points at the social phenomena of over consumption as well as at jewellery (accessories). Each exhibited artifact in blown glass (fragile, empty, translucent volumes orderly hanging from an oversized coat rack in the centre space of the gallery) was marked with a weight reference referring to actual operation protocols; metaphors for absence, gain and loss. As part of the exhibition concept a plastic aesthetic surgeon was present during the opening.