[visual art]

This is What a Feminist Looks Like:
Addie Wuensch’s jewelry makes more than a fashion statement

By: Lauren Hodges

Every piece of jewelry has some sort of meaning: lockets hold pictures of loved ones, ribbon pins support charitable causes, and that all-important ring means “back off” to those who are looking at more than a woman’s accessories. Unfortunately, jewelry has recently started to mean something a little less sentimental. Size and amount can get competitive, causing some to step over the line to tasteless. In today’s society a woman is a noboby unless she’s wearing a rock that could sink her to the bottom of the ocean. When did diamonds stop being a girl’s best friend?

According to Addie Wuensch, a local artist, girls are competitive enough without adding the battle of accessories to the mix. “There’s no reason for us to be competing with each other,” Wuensch says. “We’re all part of a sisterhood. I just hate to see two women or girls fighting.”

Wuensch, a painter at Studio1515, also writes the community-service column for the art-house’s emerging publication, Starving Artist Magazine. Her work is bold and thick, usually with a feminist undertone. For the past few years, she has also been designing Woman 2 Woman jewelry, a line of ecclectic accessories that was created with a sisterly purpose in mind.

“These necklaces always have something off-the-wall hanging off of them,” she says. “My favorite necklace, however, has a tiny little plastic doll with cut-off hair. I found it in a store in Brooklyn, and I was just obsessed with that little thing.”

She hopes that whomever ends up with the dollie swinging from her neck will get plenty of looks. “Not dirty looks!” she clarifies. “Girls get enough of those from each other. I just want people to walk up to the necklace, look at it and laugh. If you meet someone, and they instantly make you laugh, there is nothing to fight about.”

As a model who frequently works in New York City, she uses humor as a defense against anyone who might judge her based on looks. Wuensch personally tries to wear something funny every day. This particular day she is sporting a T-shirt with Chuck Norris’s fist jutting toward me. Underneath it reads, “There is nothing to fear but Chuck itself.”

As I pull on a long silver chain, I examine the attached yellow silhouette of a girl jumping rope. Rhinestones are stuck randomly into the form, and the chain swings freely from her hands. “When I made that, I wanted to remember my childhood,” Wuensch says. “I just thought it would bring out the youth, the carefree spirit in any woman. It’s so happy.”

Other choices in her line represent the necklace version of a charm bracelet, each with a collection of different trinkets hanging together in unison. “I love finding things to put in my jewelry,” she says. “I find them in consignment shops, on the street, wherever life takes me. I always find something good.”

Things get so random in her selection that she rarely makes matching earrings. “Why do they need to match?” she asks rhetorically. “I think it should be something different on each ear.”

Sissy Shop in downtown Manhattan recently snatched a few of Wuensch’s designs to begin selling in the store. “I was really excited to see my stuff in there!” she says. “They’re great people.” Of course, here in Wilmington we have first dibs on her one-of-a-kind pieces at any Studio 1515 event. Wuensch and her carousel of goodies can always be found in the front hallway of the Front Street art house, explaining each necklace and how the charms were a part of her latest adventure in womanhood.

The name of the jewelry line is eaily explained once one realizes where the proceeds of the sales are going. Wuensch donates all profit to the Wilmington Domestic Violence Shelter. “From one woman to another,” she says, exposing the inspiration for Woman 2 Woman.
Addie Wuensch’s jewelry line Woman 2 Woman can be found on Sissy Shop’s Web site, www.sissyshops.com, or by looking up her myspace page, www.myspace.com/addiepoo. Also pick up a Starving Artist Magazine around town to find out about the next Studio 1515 event. She and “the girls,” as some refer to her pieces, will be waiting in the front hall.