soCurio | art is for everyone

My mixed-media collage, assemblage and sculptures owe a debt to both the boxes of Joseph Cornell and the collages of Kurt Schwitters. Their use of color, space and dream-like imagery inspired me. I am exploring the themes of mortality, religion, and the mechanical versus nature. My appreciation and familiarity with the mechanical comes from my childhood exposure to wood and machine shops along with plastic fabrication in my parents’ factory. My art materials come from both my own extensive collections accumulated over decades and the gift of my mother’s collections after her death. Other objects that I have acquired through chance (found/abandoned) or choice (Ebay) are stacked around the studio waiting insertion into a collage, assemblage or freestanding sculpture. Broken or damaged porcelain doll heads, legs from furniture, printer’s metal alphabets, buttons and bones are all part of my vocabulary. Like an alchemist, turning lead into gold, I transform this detritus into a story, a setting or a series of relationships. Many of my pieces reference the human/or animal body—with “stand-ins” for the head, the body (or vessel) and feet/legs. My newest work is more sculptural and larger than previous works, while still examining issues that matter to me. Though trained in art, I work in a stream-of-consciousness manner allowing the meaning of each piece to unfold through my manipulation of each disparate part.