London-based Mah Rana's exquisitely-made objects highlight just how much we invest psychologically and emotionally in our jewellery.

Rana explores our relationship with jewellery, in particular how we use it in our daily lives and its role in marking significant events such as births, weddings and anniversaries.

She is concerned with how we impart meaning, almost unconsciously, into our possessions and how that meaning changes over time, depending on who has worn and owned the jewellery in the past and who might wear it today.

Taking precious metals or pieces of existing jewellery, Rana transforms them into different objects.

In the wedding-ring series, gold wedding bands have been melted down and reformed.

Through Rana's alchemy, comments about human relationships are made.

His 'n' Hers is made from two used gold wedding rings purchased from a pawnbrokers.

One has been melted down and reworked into wire, then into a miniature cage-like structure that the other ring is encased by. Is the ring caged or supported and enveloped? The viewer's response will betray their attitude towards marriage and gender relations.

As Frances Lord, the exhibition's curator, writes in the accompanying catalogue: "The human capacity to experience simultaneous yet conflicting emotions is a recurring theme in Rana's work."

In A Woman's Work, another wedding band has been forged into the shape of an iron, referencing traditional expectations of women in marriage.

The historical role of Victorian mourning jewellery is considered too. Rana is aware of its decline and the fact we don't have a contemporary equivalent with which we mark death.

For Out Of The Dark, she has made four mourning brooches from circular gold discs and worked on their surfaces in different ways.

Three are painted with black oil paint, burnt bone or lamp black pigments, which will wear off over time to reveal the gold beneath symbolising the sun and light.

The fourth brooch is covered by fabric that can be removed when the wearer is ready to move on to the next stage of life.

Here Rana demonstrates how memories and people in the past and present are associated and attached to jewellery and how rites of passage are linked with jewellery.

Rana concludes: "Through jewellery, issues of value, communication, personal and collective histories are explored.

"The work reflects the importance of owning, giving and wearing jewellery throughout our lives."

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