Space-Light-Structure: The Jewelry of Margaret De Patta

Presented in conjunction with the Museum of Arts and Design in New York, the Oakland Museum of California presents a retrospective exhibition on the work of pioneer jeweler Margaret De Patta. A seminal figure in the American Modernist Jewelry movement, De Patta was born in 1903 and moved to the Bay Area in 1923. Distinguished as one of the few American jewelers whose work and ideas were allied to the evolving ideas presented in the modern art movement, De Patta’s work was heavily influenced by the Constructivists and features architectural forms with simple lines, structure, and often movable parts. Space-Light-Structure: The Jewelry of Margaret De Patta features more than 60 jewelry pieces as well as ceramics, flatware, photographs, pictograms, and newly released archival material. OMCA holds the largest collection of De Patta’s work, most of which was donated by her husband, Eugene Bielawski, after the artist’s untimely death in 1964.