Kazuko Oshima

American, born Japan, 1942–2007

Birth placeJapan

Biographyhttp://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/04/arts/04oshima.html

October 4, 2007
Kazuko Oshima, Designer of Stone Jewelry, Dies at 65
By MARGALIT FOX
Kazuko Oshima, a noted jewelry designer whose work combined the delicacy of wire with the solidity of stone, died on Friday in Manhattan. She was 65 and lived in Manhattan.

The cause was complications of esophageal cancer, said Andrea Robinson, a friend of many years.

Sold exclusively in the United States by Barney’s, Ms. Oshima’s jewelry was popular worldwide with well-heeled women and celebrities, among them Bianca Jagger.

In Ms. Oshima’s most characteristic designs, crystals and semiprecious stones are wrapped in webs of gold wire and seem to float above the body as they encircle a wrist or neck. Ms. Oshima believed passionately that the materials that she worked with possessed great healing powers, something she often discussed in interviews.

Prices for Ms. Oshima’s work range from $400 for a small heart-shaped jasper pendant to $1,600 for a cufflike bracelet with quartz, turquoise, fluorite and red coral, according to Barney’s Web site.

Ms. Oshima was born in Tokyo on Jan. 4, 1942, and came to the United States when she was in her early 20s. Her early career was as a video artist and photographer, and she was a familiar presence in Manhattan’s Downtown art scene. She was a narrator on the soundtrack of the documentary film “Hiroshima-Nagasaki, August 1945,” released in 1970.

Ms. Oshima, who was divorced, had no children. Besides making jewelry, Ms. Oshima was known for designing lavish diaphanous scarves of metallic threads adorned with beads and gems. She made the wedding veil used by Madonna in her 1984 music video “Like a Virgin.”

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