A long time ago, Montserrat Lacomba visited an island called Formantera, where she saw a pink sea. She called it “MarDeColorRosa”.

 

 

Now, she shares her time between her home and workshop in Girona, Spain, and the island, surrounded by her beloved Mediterranean.

Landscape is the inspiration for much of her work, and she is also intrigued by the way different cultures and artistic disciplines have interpreted it. “Nature and ancient constructions, as well as the writing of ancient civilizations are starting points that open paths I like to follow, even though I never know exactly where they will take me.”

“I try to transmit in a jewel the emotion that a mountain gives me, or a river or poem that speaks about the beauty of a particular place. I love the landscapes around me which always surprise with new colors and new shapes. Often they are my inspiration, inviting me to create.”

 

 

 

Her studio is well-equipped and meticulously organised. So it is perhaps a surprise to see the forms and colours of her jewellery – at first glance they may appear raw and irregular, but on closer inspection they become something much more intriguing. It is those myriad subtle variations in landscape and the natural environment that swell and mix and diffuse that I see, and put me in mind of something greater than what is there on the bench.

 

 

She admits she sometimes feels closer to painters such as Matisse, Picasso, Miró and Tàpies than jewellers or any other discipline. “This question is very difficult for me because I admire many people and I think I have the influence of many artists too. However, I think that Silvia Walz is the jeweler with I have had a closer relationship and admire, both as a person and their work. I also really like jeweler Myung Urso, because with simple materials and forms she can convey deep feelings.”

Sometimes, Montserrat likes to explore her ideas with words first, before testing out different materials, experimenting and making many samples and sketches. “I don’t make so many drawings, I only draw first ideas and I also draw at the end, when I need to think how to resolve technical problems to reach the best solution for the piece. The most I like is working with materials in my hands and investigating different techniques. For hard things to go effortlessly, you need a lot of patience, be disciplined, to be objectively critical of your work, and to not put a limit on your time.”

 

 

 

She first studied as a painter with a Fine Arts degree from the University of Barcelona. Since then she has worked in various other disciplines as well, such as engraving, graphic design and illustration, but also taught in secondary school as a drawing teacher for 28 years. Then, ” 2000 was a very important year for me. I decided to change my life – I stopped painting and started to make jewels. In 2003 I discovered contemporary jewelry in a workshop with jeweller Silvia Walz and it fascinated me! So I’ve been working on it since then, I can’t imagine my life in any other way.”

 

 

Contemporary jewellery so captivated Montserrat that in 2008 she started the wonderful blog, mardecolorrosa.com (I love this blog! And it’s how I first discovered Montserrat a few years back). Mardecolorrosa or “pink sea” started in 2008 with a poem by Pablo Neruda dedicated to the sea. Published in Catalan (her native language) and English, it features artists from around the globe, many of whom push the boundaries of what is jewellery, and it also reviews many of the contemporary jewellery shows across Europe.

The blog is an important part of her life, and she loves it for the connections she has been able to make with other makers and designers around the world.  However, balancing her studio time with the blog is not an easy task. “Though I’m a passionate and organized person, I still feel like I’m working 24 hours a day and I try to arrange my time. The work I do as a communicator is very important to me but of course what I like most  is working at my bench in silence, creating my jewelry and I always feel that I should spend more time there.  Many years ago I made some changes in my life that allow me to dedicate all my time to jewelry. That was a really difficult but, in the end, a very good decision and now all my life is full of my work which revolves entirely around contemporary jewelry.”

This fits perfectly with her best advice and personal philosophy; “To be myself” – to stay with what you love the most.

 

 

 

 

Just for fun, I asked Montserrat what she would do if I gave her a cardboard box, a marker and a sharp knife. “I would put the knife inside the box and with the marker pen I would write in the box: knifes. Inside the box I would collect all knifes I find.” Safe, and orderly ;).

You can find more of Montserrat’s work on her own website, montserratlacomba.com and in her Etsy shop, mardecolorrosa.etsy.com. I would also urge you to check out her blog, mardecolorrosa.com.