This editorial traces the path of these unique works of ceramics, textiles, woodwork, glass, and metal, each telling its own story of tradition, innovation, and the hands that shaped it. More than just a physical voyage, this is a cultural migration, a meeting point of technique and expression, exhibiting at CONTEMPORANIA High Craftsmanship Barcelona.

Clockwise: Necklace: **Mélanie Denis, Mont-Bélair-Spring Collection**, *Dune in dirty pink*, 2025. .925 silver, plexiglass, earthenware, photo paper, ink, acetate, nylon, 38 x 15 x 1.5 cm.
Brooch: **Alex Kinsley Vey – CONTEMPORANIA Winner Best Jeweller 2023 by JORGC –** *The Third Death* (*brooch)*, 2023. Laser etched Steel, sterling silver, 23k gold leaf
Stand: **Claudio Pino,** *Architectonicus -Socle*, 2024. .925 silver, chalcedony, chrysoprase, 4.1 x 4.1 x 4 cm
Ring: **Claudio Pino,** *Asterism,* 2023. Sterling silver, 18K gold, amethyst cut by Claude Marc Aurele, pearls, tsavorite
Ring holder: **Claudio Pino**, *Metamorphosis Socle*, 2023. .925 silver, chalcedony, chrysoprase, 2.6 x 4.3 x 8.7 cm

The pieces have travelled a long journey from various cities across Canada to Europe, making stops at prestigious fairs and navigating the intricate customs procedures that accompany the international movement of artwork. Along the way, unexpected challenges were met with care and determination, adding an emotional depth to the moment of their arrival.

Unpacking each crate and experiencing the works first-hand became a moment of genuine wonder, an intimate encounter that inspired the creation of this editorial. It was conceived within the very logistics warehouse where the pieces now rest, awaiting their grand unveiling at CONTEMPORANIA Barcelona, taking place on October 2, 3, and 4 at the magnificent Palau de Pedralbes.

The Journey: Canadian Voices at CONTEMPORANIA

Canadian crafts are having a significant moment on the other side of the ocean. In major international craft events across Europe, what was once amalgamated into the broader field of North American craft is now being recognized for its distinctiveness. Canadian craft, shaped by a unique system of education, institutional support, and artist-run networks, is finally earning the focused attention it deserves.

This fall will mark the second edition of CONTEMPORANIA, a three-day event gathering fine craft artists from across the globe in Barcelona, Spain’s unique Palau Reial de Pedralbes, from October 2 to 4, 2025. At its inaugural edition in 2023, Canadian jewellery artist Alex Kinsley Vey made a lasting impression with his weathered steel jewellery. His work earned him the Official Association of Jewellers, Goldsmiths, Watchmakers and Gemologists of Catalonia (JORGC) Design Award, as well as the honour of being named featured artist for the 2025 edition, marking a significant moment for the visibility of Canadian craft on the international stage. For the upcoming edition, Kinsley Vey has developed an expansive body of work that delves into working-class life. His material vocabulary — steel, rust, and etched photographs — offers a tender, unvarnished reading of everyday rituals often dismissed as vices. Through repetitive photographic traces, mundane habits are reframed not as failures, but as quiet gestures of survival, comfort and escape. Inspired by his upbringing in southern Ontario, his work preserves the textures of lived experience and gives voice to people and places through a deeply contemplative lens.

Glassware: **Charlie Larouche-Potvin,** *Verres à pied, avec cygne et dragon et florales*, 2025. Blown glass, 24K gold. Flute: 6.5 x 6.5 x 20.5 cm; Martini: 11 x 11 x 14 cm
Knife: **Dave Fortin**, *Couteau Deva, Couteau de chef*, 2023. Multi-layer laminated carbon steel, black walnut, spalted maple, 33.8 x 3.5 cm

After visiting the 2023 Révélations Biennale in Paris, where Québec was the nation of honour, CONTEMPORANIA’s artistic director Paulo Ribeiro was struck by the audacity and the quality of the work he saw. This encounter set the stage for an invitation to exhibit at CONTEMPORANIA a bold group of nine Québec-based artists, curated by Audrey Careau. Her selection demonstrates how crafted objects contribute to shaping and communicating collective and individual identities and memories. At the junction of visual and applied arts, the selected works challenge disciplinary boundaries, forming a compelling portrait of Québec’s contemporary craft scene.

Tall boots: **Niki Jessup,** *Cuissardes Speckle Park (Fleur de peau)*, 2024. Leather and plastic, 32 x 25 x 94cm
Short boots: **Niki Jessup,** *Mules Royal Chinook d’Aquitane*, 2025. Leather, plastic, and metal, 32 x 25 x 19cm

CONTEMPORANIA’s roots trace back to its origins as Joya, a contemporary jewellery fair held in Barcelona every year for over a decade. CONTEMPORANIA’s interest in art jewellery is still significant, and Careau brings to the stage two major figures in the field, Mélanie Denis and Claudio Pino, whose work will complement Kinsley Vey’s bold jewellery pieces and contribute to position Canadian jewellery in an international context. Denis’s intricate works, combining porcelain, photography, textile and metal, explore memory and belonging, often inspired by changing landscapes, both urban and natural. Pino’s kinetic, futuristic rings evoke cosmic systems and dreamlike architectural landscapes.

**Véronique Martel**, *Mujer aguerrida*, 2024. Colored semi-porcelain, glaze, underglaze, cardboard and felt, 152 x 76 x 51 cm

Also in the realm of wearable art, Niki Jessup’s hybrid leatherworks blur fashion and sculpture with bold, sensual forms that explore the relationship between body and object while bridging tradition and technology. Careau’s vision extends far beyond body adornment. Her curation assembles a multidisciplinary cohort of artists where each singularly contributes to a collective narrative, where material is not just a medium, but a form of storytelling. Notably, Milady Hartmann’s textile and paper anthropomorphic sculptures straddle theatre, fashion and fantasy, echoing haute couture and childhood storytelling. As for glass artist Charlie Larouche-Potvin, he brings traditional Venetian forms into new narrative territory, pulling from the language of fantasy literature and film. Similarly, Paul Guidera’s beastly sculptures stand as ambiguous figures that reinterpret ancestral ceramic forms, while ceramic artist Véronique Martel creates voluptuous amphorae that marry technical precision with a powerful sense of expression, allegorically evoking the strength and resilience of women. Atelier C.U.B. adds to the dreamlike atmosphere with their sculptural furniture, marrying leather marquetry and cabinetmaking with a whimsical, surrealist energy. Their work offers a playful counterpoint to the minimalist aesthetic of modern furniture-making. Dave Fortin’s functional yet poetically charged knives bring forward the symbolic weight of the Québec landscape through intricate Damascus patterns and the use of historically significant and locally sourced materials.

**Paul Guidera,** *Consciences Hybrides*, 2023. Stoneware, matte glaze, rope and gold luster, 28 cm x 28 cm x 63 cm

Carrying the weight of place and experience, from Alex Kinsley Vey’s steel renderings of everyday habits to Dave Fortin’s knives embedded with territorial sensibility, these works become a distinctly Canadian language, where craft functions not as decoration, but as a form of cultural translation. Canadian makers are claiming their own narrative, one rooted in specific landscapes, histories, and ways of seeing and being. This reunion of Canadian makers contributes to asserting craft’s power as cultural diplomacy.

Top: **Milady Hartmann,** *Velvet Reverberations*, 2025. Textiles, velvet and paper, 84 x 48 x 28 cm
Bottom: **Atelier CUB,** *Spécimen nº04*, 2025. Bleached maple and buffalo leather 36 x 36 cm

Photographer: Celia Suárez - Art Director: Paulo Ribeiro
Production: María Vásconez, Patryk Walczak, Laia Sánchez
COURTESY OF CONTEMPORANIA Barcelona
Special thanks to Conseil des métiers d’art du Québec Location: RESA Logistic

This article will be published in the Fall/Winter 2025-2026 issue of Studio Magazine.