The Desired Effect: Spotlight on Winifred Mason Chenet
Welcome and thank you for coming along on this blog journey!
We have great hopes for this blog: to keep you updated on the work that we’re doing at We Wield the Hammer, which may even occasionally include guest blogs from our former students. We also want to share with you all the magic and art, the genius and creativity, the work and the effort, the resilience and resourcefulness of women of African descent the world over, beginning with but not solely limited to metal artists. Sometimes we are fortunate to make in pristine and controlled environments with extraordinary tools; sometimes we create in more modest circumstances driven by an unknown force; and sometimes, we are born creatives, unable to ignore the light inside us that must be brought forth. We are inspired and motivated in every moment by black women’s contribution to the culture of every society she inhabits. And we call the blog “The Desired Effect” because we hope to educate, engage and even entertain in offering up a few of the extraordinary stories of the work of black women who create.
The quote that brought you to this page is from the brilliant visionary, Winifred Mason Chenet. Born in 1918 to West Indian parents in Brooklyn, NY. Ms. Mason was an exceptional student graduating with a BS in English Lit and receiving an MA in teaching from NYU. After teaching crafts for several years, she applied for and received a Rosenwald Fund grant which led her to Haiti and creations honoring the spiritual and cultural practices of the island. Upon her return, her custom-made jewelry – which she made at home – began to take off and she was courted by major department stores. Opening her eponymous shop in the mid 1940s, her works grew more popular and she took on employees and apprentices including Art Smith, the brilliant silversmith who is the most widely known black artist of the modern period. Ms. Mason worked both in NYC, in Greenwich Village and in Haiti, where she maintained a home with her Haitian born husband.
She worked primarily in copper and though she was very popular in the 1940s and 50s, very little remains written about her. I once read an article where she was accused of having an “attitude” and was the reason her works fell out of favor in the 50s. It was in that moment that she became a primary motivator. I understand that it takes “attitude” to be first, to be a visionary, to be a creator. It takes “attitude” to hammer and forge and custom make tools to form and shape metal into beautiful wearable art desired and demanded by celebrities and the intelligentsia. It takes “attitude” to run a business, successfully. Without “attitude”, most women wouldn’t succeed in many cultures, let alone the arts. Accusations of attitude and ego are thinly veiled attacks designed to minimize and control our muses. And our bodies. And still we persevere. Ms. Mason survived an attack on her husband by the Tonton Macoute and was able to escape Haiti, returning to the US in the mid 60s, living a quiet life until her death.
Ms. Mason’s life’s work inspires generations of jewelers and metal artists, especially black women metal artists. Her tenacity and her verve cannot be dulled by her near erasure from historical record. Art Smith has become synonymous with “black jewelry designers” because his work was exquisite; he was a silversmith of great renown. He was also someone who was written about over the course of his work and even after his death. We know his story because he has been catalogued and notated and revered in print. I am grateful for the attention shown Art Smith because in recounting his life repeatedly and detailing his work – which also remains scant for someone who created for more than 30 years – he has given Winifred Mason the opportunity to be remembered. I discovered her work because of my interest in his. She used vèvè and other symbology in her work, celebrating the Haitian culture in great detail. She was brilliant and forthright, talented and determined, resourceful and giving. A metal artist and an arts educator. A trailblazer, and in her honor, we intend to document our journeys, tell our stories, be remembered.