Ruth Robinson obituary

http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2013/dec/10/ruth-robinson-obituary

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My mother, Ruth Robinson, who has died aged 97, began a successful second career as a contemporary jeweller in her 50s, while studying at Camden Institute and Sir John Cass School of Art (now London Metropolitan University). Her work was shown at London galleries and arts fairs and she exhibited as far afield as Nicosia and Barcelona.

Ruth developed a technique for knitting silver wire with beads to produce unique pieces, both light and durable, and many jewellers learned from her other innovative creations. She found inspiration during her trips to Mexico, China, Poland, India and South Africa.

On her 90th birthday, friends organised a retrospective exhibition in London and Berlin. She chose the title Full Circle to reflect the fact that she was returning to her native country for the exhibition: she was born Ruth Katzenstein into a Jewish family in rural central Germany.

In 1934 she had the good luck to leave Germany with a group travelling to Palestine to work on a collective settlement. She then moved to Vienna in 1937 to train as a Montessori kindergarten teacher; she escaped on the night that German troops marched into Austria. Returning to Palestine, she again worked with children and met my father, Robbie Robinson, a major in the British army. They married in 1947 and returned to Britain, where Ruth initially worked in nurseries in London.

Ruth had a strong, warm, outgoing personality; she was feisty and often dismissive of authority. An elegant dresser, she could be seen wearing leather trousers in her 80s and she remained young at heart. She was active until her last few years when she suffered from dementia and restricted mobility.

On the day she died, "stumbling stones" were laid outside her childhood family home in Herleshausen, Hesse, to commemorate the other members of her family who had not managed to escape from Germany and had been killed during the Holocaust.

She is survived by Robbie and me.

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