Diamond Flash from The Diamond Project Camera

General Introduction:





The diamond series was originally comprised of 7 different objects made throughout 2004 that each feature diamonds in unusual ways to elicit a reflection on luxury, consumption, beauty, and commitment. Natural diamonds are the hardest and one of the rarest materials on earth. Although they have been harvested for thousands of years, during the early modern period their extraction and trade became a lucrative global industry. Old and new trade routes were stimulated by the emergent and intensifying colonial networks which gave wealthy patrons throughout the world, from the Mughal empire to European absolutist monarchies, unprecedent access to these costly gems. Diamonds were symbols of wealth, power, and prestige. As their circulation increased, new cutting techniques were developed, magnifying the beauty of these precious stones which were mounted on the most intricately designed jewels, accessories, and ornaments of the time.


The interest and hunger for diamonds however, went far beyond the privileged and closed-off world of the aristocracy. In the late 17th and early 18th centuries, great artisans such as George Ravenscroft or George-Frédéric Strass perfected formulas to make high quality glass-paste imitation diamonds. Such techniques enabled highly skilled glassmakers and jewelers to produce stones that closely resembled diamonds, but for a fraction of the price. With the Industrial Revolution, by the late 19th century the European middle-class expanded and had newly disposable income and opportunities to socialize. In this context jewelry that featured imitation diamonds became a ubiquitous sight throughout the metropolises of Europe.


Despite falling out of fashion during the first half of the 20th century, the widespread appeal of inexpensive diamonds made a triumphant return during the second half of the 20th century. New technologies involving high-pressure, high-temperature (HPHT) or chemical vapor disposition (CVD) techniques enabled the production of synthetic diamonds. These have the exact same chemical and physical properties as naturally formed diamonds. Consequently, ‘real’ diamonds of all shapes and colors became accessible with unprecedented ease as they entered the increasingly mass-producing and consumerist societies of the late 20th century. Despite their greater availability, diamonds hardly lost their status and appeal as luxury goods as this image was communicated and amplified though popular culture. Movies like Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, Breakfast at Tiffany’s, The Pink Panther, Diamonds are Forever or even Moulin Rouge are but a few examples.


As such, it is more than fitting that Tobias Wong, a conceptual designer whose work interrogates and plays with ideas surrounding the consumption of luxury, made a series centered around diamonds. In a 2003 interview for SOMA, when asked by Hillary Latos what types of materials he likes to work with, Wong responded with characteristic humorous ambiguity: “Diamonds. All diamonds.” Throughout his diamond series, with each individual object he proposes a different reflection on the world’s most coveted mineral, portraying them at once as objects of beauty, desire, elegance, strength, danger, and boundless vanity. Following his philosophy of making “paraconceptual” design in his attempt to expose the similarities between art and design, the diamond series presents objects which can be appreciated for their beauty and aesthetics in conjunction with their conceptual depth rather than in lieu of it. A year later in 2005, with collaborator Ju$t Another Rich Kid, Wong designed the INDULGENCES series which similarly to the Diamond series offers a reflection on the consumption of luxury but this time through gold.





Diamond Flash:





For the Diamond Flash, Tobias Wong embedded diamond dust within the flash unit of a Casio digital camera. The precise camera model was the Casio Exilim EX-S2 ultra-slim which was the thinnest and most compact digital camera on the market when it came out in 2002. The EX-S2’s stylishly slim design, its user-friendly features and decent image resolution made it an ideal choice for everyday photographs taken while on the go. It was part of a broader trend in the early 2000s during which compact digital cameras gained increasing popularity and became more accessible. By adding diamonds to the flash unit of the Casio cameras he edited, which were three in total, Wong was immediately enhancing their value and marking them as luxurious objects. Although the presence of diamonds in a flashing unit could potentially amplify the burst of light’s brightness, it is unlikely that the precious stones had any significant effect on the image captured. Rather than being functional, the use of gemstones here seems to have more of a conceptual and figurative role. Wong was pointing out how the mere mention of diamonds is sufficient to imbue the object they bedazzle with a desirable aura of exclusivity and uniqueness. Perhaps the gemstones were intended to make a deeper comment about the early 2000s as a time marked by vanity through the advent of digital technologies with an ever-more visual cult of fame and the internet with its first social media platforms. Nonetheless, the tone behind Diamond Flash remains playful. At the end of the day, who wouldn’t want to have their photograph taken with a camera that had diamonds in its flash?

Diamond Flash from The Diamond Project Camera; Designed by Tobias Wong (1974–2010); metal, glass, plastic, electronic components, diamond; H x W x D: 5.4 × 8.6 × 1.3 cm (2 1/8 × 3 3/8 × 1/2 in.); The Tobias Wong Collection, Gift of Phyllis Chan and Gordon Wong; 2024-4-16