The Molecule Maker
Ever fancied some geek-chic, molecule-shaped jewellery? Well, no doubt you do now and Raven Hanna is the woman who can make it for you. Null editor, Hayley Birch quizzed her about her nerdy fashion designs.
Sci-artist, Raven Hanna, is a self-confessed geek. Not only does she make jewellery based on molecules, she fashions dolls in the shape of bacteria and reads books about neurotransmitters in her free time.
But she’s clearly not the only person geeky enough to want a serotonin necklace or an amino acid bracelet; people are queuing up in droves to buy her unique designs. “People are really excited about it. A chemistry trade journal published an article about me a little over a year ago and that’s when everything really started moving.”
“I suddenly got a lot of orders, but I also received these wonderful emails from chemists which had a subject line that would say ‘2,3-thiobromophenol-whatever’ and the body message would be ‘This is the best molecule ever, this is the molecule I work on. I think you should make it.’”
So how does someone who spent five years in graduate school studying biophysics and biochemistry end up as an artist? Hanna says she’s always had a creative streak. “I think my artistic side sort of caught up with me and started vying for attention.”But why molecule jewellery? “I was reading about neurotransmitters – just for fun,” she says, stifling a giggle, “because I was interested to know where mood and emotions come from. I saw serotonin and thought it was really beautiful and wanted it for a necklace. So I thought I could maybe Google it and find somewhere to buy it, but I tried and couldn’t, so I decided to make it for myself.”
Browsing through Hanna’s designs on madewithmolecules.com, it strikes me that they’re incredibly complex for an amateur jewellery maker. Serotonin wouldn’t be the first thing I would try my hand at if I’d never made a necklace before. So how does she do it?
“The original one I actually made just using a silver wire. But, yeah, it would be difficult if I hadn’t found out about rapid prototyping.” Rapid what? “You make a 3D file in a CAD [computer assisted design] programme, send it off to somebody who has a printer that can actually print three dimensions in resin and you can cast that into silver.” Hanna learned rapid prototyping from an artist called Bathsheba Grossman, who makes mathematical and geometric sculptures using the technique.
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So who actually wears this stuff, I wonder. Is it just scientists? Hanna says her customers feel they have some sort of connection with her. She receives emails every day telling her stories about why they like her designs and why they’re buying her jewellery. “They vary a lot, from people who are starting menopause, so they say, ‘I need to have an oestrogen, as a symbol for that’, or people who need to go off their antidepressants and they’re like, ‘I really need to have serotonin’, as a symbol, you know, to stay happy.”
It seems like it’s a kind of placebo effect then. “Exactly,” says Hanna, “I absolutely believe in the placebo effect!”
But there must be a lot of scientists interested in buying these designs as well? “Yeah, there are also, of course, a lot of scientists who enjoy it. I think that it especially fits the niche for scientists who really want to share what they love about science with friends and family members who might not also be sciencey geeks. But I hope my stuff is pretty enough for non-scientists to dig it too.”
Thinking I’ll be able to lull her into a false sense of security by confessing to my own geekish tendencies, I try to probe her inner geek a little further, but Hanna needs no persuading. “I’m definitely a sort of a science geek.” she laughs. “I think my stuff really appeals to people like us,” - oh, now, I’m hanging with the big geeks - “because I try to make my stuff, first, really aesthetic, so people would want to wear it just as jewellery. But it also has the nerdiness and the meaning behind it. It’s a way almost of tribal recognition if somebody comes up to you on the street and says, ‘Oh is that a chemical? What is that? Tell me about it.’ Then it’s kind of a way for nerds to connect.”
So what next? More geekery? “Oh, there are always many plans. I would like to make bigger art pieces, starting with large molecule mobiles, which would be fun, you know. But eventually, I’ll probably do something else besides molecules.” Like attending next year’s GeekPride march with the Null? “I would love that! Send me the details! That would be a great excuse to get across the ocean!”Visit madewithmolecules.com for all your molecular jewellery needs. There's also geeky stationery and clothing.
If you enjoyed this you might want to read about one of these other geeks:
- Brainiac man - Jon Tickle takes time out with the Null
- The monster hunter - Jonathan Downes on 40 ft snakes and African dragons
- The biggest geeks of all - Our writers
Or how about joining up to march for geek rights at GeekPride '08 on Facebook?
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