COAL JEWELRY: TOWARDS ADDING NEW MEANINGS

Abstract

As coal combustion is one of the main global pollutants, the EU is trying to reduce the use of this fossil fuel and stimulate the production of electricity from renewable sources. In the Pljevlja region, traces of mining can be found dating back to distant past, but coal exploitation did not start to play a key role in the town’s development until the socialist period. In the years when the Pljevlja Thermal Power Plant is facing the threat of shutdown due to the hours of operation provided by the EU’s Large Combustion Plants Directive, and when the future of coal exploitation in Pljevlja and its whole economy have been put into question, local artists and entrepreneurs gathered in the NGO "Umbrella for the Sun" („Kišobran za Sunce“) have begun to manufacture jewellery and other items decorated with pieces of local coal. Based on a broad theoretical framework of creative industries, the paper analyses this interesting and innovative project of female entrepreneurship and focuses on the process of creating a new symbolic cultural identity and an aesthetic experience of coal.