Yevgeniya Kaganovich

Yevgeniya Kaganovich’s Pearl Necklace Series examines how jewelry functions as a cultural signifier. Pearls have long been associated with prestige, status, and power, but they also carry connotations of purity, innocence, corruption, and seduction. This series explores these contradictions by transforming small freshwater pearls into the illusion of a large, perfect pearl necklace.

Kaganovich challenges the value placed on materials. A pearl is, at its core, a scar, a response to an irritation that has been elevated to an object of luxury. By encasing pearls in translucent synthetic forms, she plays with notions of authenticity and preciousness. The result is an image of a pearl necklace rather than a traditional strand, questioning what makes jewelry desirable.

Through techniques like blanking, silhouetting, and inflating forms, the pieces exist both as adornment and as cultural reflection. They occupy a space between material and image, challenging how jewelry communicates identity, power, and aspiration. Kaganovich does not merely recreate the pearl necklace; she deconstructs its meaning.