Python Hot Pants

Mallory Weston is a Philadelphia-based jewelry artist. A graduate of Rhode Island School of Design, for the last four years Weston has been Assistant Professor at Temple University. Last June she was one of three contemporary artists invited to give the MFA’s Daphne Farago Lecture on Jewelry. These Python Hot Pants are a departure from Weston's more traditional jewelry. Nevertheless, they serve as a bridge between the pop culture that inspires her oeuvre and textile techniques that she applies to metal. The craftsmanship is impeccable–on the front metal elements have been pieced together and then cut and sewn to resemble snakeskin; metal buckles appear on the sides and the reverse is executed in leather. Inspired by the fashions of the disco era these hot pants were made for exhibition at the Pulse art fair held in Miami Beach, during Art Basel, in December 2016. They were made to fit the artist.

The MFA jewelry collection includes work by other artists who apply textile techniques to metal. For example, Hanne Behrenes knits in silver wire, and Mary Lee Hu uses gold as if it were thread. However, Weston’s hot pants are the first example to use a needle and thread technique and would beautifully complement these two works and others already in the collection. Weston’s work makes a strong addition to the jewelry collection and contemporary craft, but also to the fashion and textile collections. From a historical perspective, it also relates to garments and accessories where gold or metal threads are an integral part of the design and construction. These could be used in a variety of creative ways in Farago gallery, Kaplan gallery, or some future fashion gallery.