Ingeborg Bratman

Ingeborg Bratman moved from textile design to jewellery and studied at Hornsey in 1965-8 before titanium was in use there.
Her experiments with tantalum began in the mid 1970s when she was encouraged to look for unusual metals by Sarah Hosking who organised a series of themed travelling exhibitions, one of which was “metals”. Ingeborg had heard of tantalum through family connections and a chance encounter with a client secured an introduction to Plessey in the UK who were industrial users of the metal. The pieces were produced in the late 1970s with technical assistance from Plessey and welding done by BOC in an argon gas chamber.
Tantalum has an attractive deep blue/grey colour and is only coloured by anodising.