“Anything is possible”: Zdeněk Vacek on 25 years of turning life into jewellery
One of Czechia’s most distinctive jewellery designers, Zdeněk Vacek currently has a sensational retrospective of his quarter-century career at Prague’s Museum of Decorative Arts. Vacek, a goldsmith by trade, was previously known for his work under the name Zorya with then life partner Daniel Pošta but now operates solo, mainly producing tailor-made pieces for often affluent clients. I spoke to him at the exhibition.
What brought you to the whole world of being a goldsmith and designing and making jewellery?
“It happened by coincidence, I think. When I was a child I was really ill. I had a big issue with asthma and I spent a lot of time in my childhood in hospital.
“I didn’t have any idea what I wanted to do as an adult.
“But my mother wanted to find something nice and quiet and we said, Let’s try the exams for goldsmith, jewellery designer.
“It was an excellent choice, because when I started to prepare for the exams that was really the first time I started do things like painting or something with my hands, like ceramics.
“And I realised I really liked it.”
Do you think being sick as a child influenced you in terms of giving you more time to think about things? I know that a lot of creative people have a similar story – that they were isolated as kids and for that reason their imagination maybe developed more.
“No, but it’s a nice question. I think the situation where I was really alone in the hospital brought me patience.
“If you asked me if I would want to change something in my childhood, I would say no.”
After working on your own you cofounded the successful studio Zorya in 2011 and it ran for about 10 years. How do you look back on Zorya today?
“It was full of so many new experiences and when Daniel and I worked together I loved that.
“When we met it was like two worlds met at a good time and place.
“My mother wanted to find something nice and quiet and we said, Let’s try the exams for goldsmith.”
Zdeněk Vacek
“We started dating each other and step by step we worked together closely. And after that we built Zorya.
“It was more than 11 years; we really worked together for almost 20 years.
“Those experiences in our careers and our private lives were really rich. So I’m happy for that.
“And those experiences pushed me – I didn’t imagine when I was at school that I would be doing projects like today.”
Now, when you’re working under your own name, typically who are your clients? Are they Czech? Are they from abroad? Who are the people who you work for usually?
“My clients are from everywhere. They’re from different social classes and I’m happy about that.
“Because I really like doing jewels for, for example, young people – in that same way that I work for very rich people.
“And thanks to jewels, let’s say, I get to meet and know different types of people.”
But when you say some of the clients are rich and some are young, can you charge less money to young people?
“There are, like, five of us in my studio and we do bespoke jewels, because I really like that and that’s my speciality.
“And we also do collections: from gold, from precious stones and also from silver, as well as sometimes experimental materials like 3D printed titanium and stainless steel.
“So we have more products.
“It’s not really cheap. I don’t know how to make cheap jewels [laughs], but I’m happy about that.
“But I think you can find a dream piece at our studio.”
When you talk about bespoke jewellery, how does that work? I guess the client comes to you and you have a conversation? How much do you listen to their ideas, for example?
“I’m very happy that people come to me and I have a very free way when it comes to making jewels.
“But anyway I really to speak with them and find out their real wish – what they really want: are we making a gift for somebody, or is it for them?
“Because some people want to invest money in craftspeople and precious materials – gold and really precious stones – but sometimes the value of jewels, as a gift to somebody, is personal.
“I prepare something like homework for clients: that they sit and think about what they really you to say with this piece.”
Zdeněk Vacek
“So we build boundaries and then that’s the field where we can work together.
“I prepare something like homework for them: that they sit and think about what they really you to say with this piece.”
By us here are rings and bracelets and most of them have names above the subscriptions? Are they the names of the owners [the exhibition contains many items borrowed back from clients]?
“In some cases, yes. Sometimes we have a working name and it just stays, and sometimes we name them after the owner, because [laughs] what else?”
I was reading that some of the people who own your pieces include Patti Smith, PJ Harvey and Johnny Depp. How has your work reached people?
“Along with my super colleague Marie, who I have worked with for almost 12 years, we have met so many people through our work.
“That includes actors and singers. Sometimes they have concerts in the Czech Republic and we try to meet them, normally, like, Wouldn’t it be nice if they wore our stuff?
“So we try and, thanks to Marie, it happened [laughs].
“Sometimes it’s a gift and sometimes they pay. For example Madeleine Albright had a brooch of mine, which she bought, which I was really happy about.
“Mostly there’s a condition: Those people say, Please don’t photograph us together, don’t make this into advertising. And we respect that.”
To go back to when you were studying, when you are learning to work with gold, diamonds and so on, those materials are so valuable I guess you can’t make many mistakes?
“I was at school three years – it was just craft.
“It was really step by step: working with ordinary steel or metal.
“[Famous people] say, Please don’t photograph us together, don’t make this into advertising.”
Zdeněk Vacek
“But one day they gave us silver, and one day they gave us gold. And I was really stressed – you can’t make any mistakes.
“But in one moment I realised: Don’t worry about it – you have to use it like ordinary steel.
“That was helpful for me; I lost my fear about it.”
You’ve been working for 25 years now. Has the technology changing affected how you do your work?
“The world of technology changes really quickly.
“You can see this in my exhibition. Because in 2007 I discovered laser cutting – so you can here at the exhibition when I discovered it [laughs].
“I like to discover new technology and to mix stuff together.”
In preparing for this interview I found out that there’s such a thing as 3D printing of gold. I presume the equipment is really expensive, and I presume everything you do is really expensive – you also have to be a great businessman, I guess?
“[Laughs] I can say I’m really talented, but I really need a businessman to sell our stuff.
“No, if you’re an artist it’s like two people in one body, because I really want to be a businessman but in so many situations an actual businessman could be better than me, because I’m really an artist – chaotic.”
I notice you use quite unusual materials. For example I saw one piece with human hair, which maybe is your mother’s. What other kinds of strange materials do you use? Teeth, I read somewhere.
“Yes, also teeth. Whatever you bring me I can make jewels from.
“But I wanted to say, when we were speaking about technology, that I really like to mix it – technology and real craftsmanship.
“An actual businessman could be better than me, because I’m really an artist – chaotic.”
Zdeněk Vacek
“When somebody says, I don’t know how you made that – it’s not possible to realise that, for me that’s real praise.
“So I really like to mix technology and craft and in this exhibition you can see this mixing.
“For example in the main piece, about my mother, in the middle there is a pink urn from glass and from the ashes of my mother.
“We made it with Johan Pertl, who’s a glassworker, and we melted her ashes with pink crystal.”
So anything can be used?
“Anything is possible [laughs].”
What’s the concept of the exhibition? The first half is dark, you’re enveloped in darkness, and the second half is very bright and kind of shiny. What was the thinking behind the two parts?
“My wish was – and also my condition was – that I would do the architecture of the exhibition by myself.
“Because I realised it would be super nice to build it as a path through life.
“When somebody says, I don’t know how you made that, for me that’s real praise.”
Zdeněk Vacek
“For me it was really important to show my experiences, from my private life and also from my, let’s say, business life, because they’re connected.”
As well as all this amazing art, there are also these texts that you wrote where you speak about, for example, your drug addiction, your sexuality, or the death of your mother, who died last year. Why did you create these personal texts?
“Sometimes it’s happened that when I was at an exhibition you see things but you don’t have a chance to be close to the artist.
“And that was my wish.”
Zdeněk Vacek: DARK’n’LUSH
Museum of Decorative Arts
17. listopadu 2
Prague 1
Until 2.11.2025
