John Nels Hatleberg
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Security, Patience, Perseverance
There were not a lot of people able to tell me how to get here.
I struggled for years.
By age ten it was obvious that the piano lessons were not
going to work. I have incredible parents, and they recognized
that out of nowhere I had a passion for gems. It was
unbelievably intuitive of them. How fortunate for me that
they found and signed me up for a gem-cutting course at an
adult education program in the basement of a suburban
Maryland recreation center. It was me and a bunch of retirees
cutting agate cabochons underground. It was the best of
times.
When the course was over we signed me up again. While
I was still in elementary school my parents found an elderly
man in our community who introduced me to the pinnacle of
“the art”—how to facet gems. Mostly though, Joe Touchette
taught me about patience. I apprenticed with him on Saturday
mornings until I left for college. While learning about
gems with Joe, I also interned at the Smithsonian, which enhanced
my quest and inevitably seasoned me to that precious
world.
During college my faceting machine stayed with me, but I
never turned it on. I was taking in the freedom of school and
subconsciously searching for a way to link the interests that
preceded even my early attraction to gems, art and magic, to
the jewels themselves.
My pursuit of gems and art became an innate part of my
being—both profound and spiritual. I guess I could have been
Source: Printed with permission from John Nels Hatleberg.
moved by sports—I loved to water ski and I unicycled so
much that some people thought I didn’t know how to walk.
I could have been moved by religion or politics; but I chose
art. I had the personality to be seized by this pursuit in a relentless
manner.
My quest to master the art and science of conceptual gem
artistry grew and continued. My life was committed to not
only being the best at it, but also bringing it to the next possible
level. This brought me back to the Smithsonian a few
summers after I completed graduate school. It was at this
time that I was afforded a pivotal and career altering experience
by John White, the Smithsonian’s gem curator.
It was almost as if I were reading a wonderful novel and I
was a character in the book. The excitement of the story was
building and the magical turning point was finally in reach.
The story read like this:
The Hope Diamond was taken from its vault and transferred
to a darkened room. For several moments, John
White, the Smithsonian gem curator, helped me charge
this historical, rare and world-famous diamond with short
wave light. In the darkness, the largest blue diamond in
the world turned red and glowed like a coal, muted like a
dying ember. The only light in the room came from the
stone itself. This most famous of diamonds, steeped in
centuries of intrigue and allure and of the highest cultural
and historical rarity, was phosphorescing red. It seemed
possessed.
Seeing this electrifying transformation irrevocably altered
the art that has since emerged from me. I became aware that
gems, which often serve as meaningful yet conventional symbols
in our lives, have the potential to show us to ourselves,
reveal aspects of our personalities and lives.
Artists are always remaking the same piece. I have probably
spent the last twenty years attempting to create objects
with a transcendence akin to that which emanates from engagement
rings. They are a perfect package. This has led me
to an unprecedented diversity in my work with jewels. I have
vaporized diamonds to create diamond air, lasered pure gold
tattoos, made mirrors of meteorites, sandwiched holograms
in gems, and found a pearl that appears so uncannily to be a
heart that people have sensed it beating.
For the last 15 years I have also had the honor of working
with the world’s most famous diamonds. I am primarily known
for this work. When given complete access to a famous diamond,
I can facet a replica that is visually indistinguishable
from the original. It is shocking to compare the two jewels
side by side. At times they incite awe.
The Hope-Centenary, Dresden Green, Eureka, Excelsior,
Shah Jahan Table Cut, Guinea Star, McLean/Duchess of Windsor,
Oppenheimer, Portuguese, B.1ueHeart, Millennium Star,
Victoria Transvaal, Incomparable and other diamonds have
been entrusted to my care. What is it like to work with these
jewels? It is a transporting experience. The diamonds are so
powerful, so beautiful, so rare, valuable, and seductive.
Some people say that I have worked on more famous diamonds
than anyone else in history. In part due to technological
advances, it is true that I am the only one in the world that
has taken the creation of replicas to the realm of an exacting
art form. There were not a lot of people able to tell me how
to get here. I struggled for years.
In this narrative, I have suggested how I have pursued
singular and potent jewels, how I am affected by them, and
how I am able to transfer that inspiration to what I do. Of
primary importance growing up was my feeling secure in my
parents’ love. They encouraged me to explore. My parents
told me they would believe in me as long as I believed in my-
self. This security and my patience to follow a muse seem to
insure my path.
This year I will be shown a new diamond recently
wrenched from the earth in Africa, a diamond that is so
vividly colored, so pure, so big, and so brilliant that when I
look into it I expect I will see all the way to Pluto. I hope your
travels in life take you far as well.