THE new exhibition at Make South West, the makers gallery at Bovey Tracey, is a potent and thought-provoking display of the response of 35 international artists to the challenge of transforming knives into works of art.
Swords into Ploughshares: Knives into Jewels, on at the Devon gallery until 13th May, is a touring exhibition curated by Professor Norman Cherry and Dauvit Alexander.
In this multi-disciplinary project, the curators have highlighted and examined the phenomenon of knife crime currently being experienced across Britain.
At the core of the project was an invitation to 35 international jewellery and metals artists to create new bodies of work by refashioning, repurposing, adapting, or otherwise transforming knives which have been surrendered to UK police.
Participating artists have come from all over the world, including Australia, the US, Estonia, Ireland, Germany, Mexico, Norway, Netherlands, Korea and Italy.
Image: Negotiating Heart to Knife Peacefully, and Creatively Housing Swords into Ploughshares by a Korean-American artist, Komelia Okim; quartet of images: Taavi Teevet, Cristina Filipe, Dauvit Alexander and Risto Tali.