The Cable Revolution and Evolution
The Cable Revolution
and Evolution
As a primary form, cable is found in the natural world and in the arts; as such it belongs to a universal family of shapes across world cultures…These sculptural forms run through the whole of human experience.
Long before humans, plants made cable, and by example taught us how to do so. Throughout history, cable is linked with communication and connection. Archeological evidence from diverse areas indicates cable was originally developed as a technology for giving strength to materials by twisting natural fibers together…Through nature, technology, and art, cable connects the full range of human experience.
In unlocking a connection with the creativity of the past, the cable motif allowed the Yurmans to inhabit a world derived from an ancestral family of design.
David Yurman, well before he formalized a career as a sculptor and jeweler, prophetically encountered the meaning of cable in nature. He recounts a story about his youth: “Occasionally, I made the rebellious decision to play hooky and visit a wooded area with beautiful trees encircled with enormous hanging vines, so strong you could swing on them. It was a visceral connection with a natural form.”
P A U L G R E E N H A L G H is the director of the Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts at the University of East Anglia, in Norwich, U.K., and the former director and president of the Corcoran Gallery of Art and Corcoran College of Art and Design in Washington, D.C.