Frances Stachl (Ngāpuhi)
Frances Stachl is a jewellery maker whose work reflects a grounded focus on materials and immense pleasure in the physical process of making.
Her trademark neckpieces are finely and expertly constructed and are ultimately pieces of great beauty that are eminently wearable.
Stachl studied at Whanganui Polytechnic in the early 1990s and graduated with a Diploma of Craft and Design from Whitireia Community Polytechnic in 1999.
In 2014 her work was included in a major exhibition of New Zealand jewellery, Wunderrūma, curated by Karl Fritsch and Warwick Freeman that travelled first to Galerie Handwerk in Munich and then to The Dowse Art Museum in Lower Hutt.
In 2015 Stachl began a project with the support of the Sarjeant Gallery, Whanganui and Creative NZ to engage with unique stories relating to objects and jewellery in her hometown of Whanganui. The resulting body of work, Fiction in the Space Between, was exhibited at the Sarjeant Gallery in 2016.
Stachl’s work is widely collected both in New Zealand and overseas.