55 places. 62 incidents. 66 guns. 73 dead.
Weapon pendants as worn by volunteer models from the Seattle Metals Guild, Amazon USA employees and friends and other friends and interested Seattle community members. Thank you all for supporting this anti-gun-violence message in such a visible way.
1.1.2017 is a large scale jewellery work that contains portraits of each of the 66 guns used in fatal incidents on January 1st, 2017. These gun effegies are made in metal, plastic, fabric and paper, from containers crowd-sourced from the 55 places in which these acts of violence occurred. When no gun details were reported, one of two popular and high-selling default pistols was substituted. According to the Department of Justice, pistols are the largest-manufactured gun type in the US.
After crowd sourcing 73 containers from the 55 towns where the guns were used, weapons were matched to containers, the outline of each gun (or multiple weapons if someone was shot by more than one person,) was hand sawn or cut into its corresponding object. The cutouts became pendants once strung onto ball chain, while each altered container was fitted with an identification tag that included the name of the deceased and the make and model of the weapon depicted in the work.
My huge thanks to the many members of the Seattle Metals Guild who came along to help photograph 1.1.2017, especially Jana Brevick on styling, assistant director Miri Stone, and coordinator Natascha Bybee. Also a big thank-you to the many others from around the USA who donated items used to make the final piece. Donors received a '73' pendant in exchange for donating a container to the artwork.
Research: https://www.melissacameron.net/blog/?page_id=8003
Photographs: Melissa Cameron, 2018
