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Rebecca Welz

 
 

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Artist’s Statement
 

My work is inspired by natural wonders and ecological processes that combine to give us biodiversity. I am concerned with the role that humans have in sustaining or destroying our biodiversity. My steel sculpture utilizes lines that combine together to make form relating to systems and networks in nature such as the underground mycelium fungi that connect plants and trees together. Studying and teaching biomimicry has led me to discover a myriad of remarkable functions in the natural world which continue to energize me.

Observing how rivers cut through land and seeing the types of curves the water forges is another source of inspiration. From above, rivers appear to be veins in the earth carrying life blood. Networks of lines symbolize wireframe skeletal structure at its most minimal to veins flowing through our bodies to roots carrying nutrients to trees.

The most recent work incorporates small clay forms threaded onto wire that intertwine through the steel. These works make reference to water bodies and ocean gyres that are filled with particulates, either natural or humanmade. For healthy aquatic ecosystems a combination of plant, mineral, living organisms and fragments that are shed are part of the mix. We humans have contributed plastic particles, industrial materials and agricultural runoff. All of these distinct materials travel together in a suspension of dynamic energy.

Born in Sausalito, California, Rebecca Welz is a sculptor working in Jersey City, New Jersey. She is a professor at Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, New York. Her sculptures have been featured in museums and galleries throughout the US, including June Kelly Gallery and Grace Borgenicht Gallery in NYC; the Oakland Museum in California; the Heckscher Museum in Huntington, New York; the Butters Gallery in Portland, Oregon; and Sculpturesite Gallery, San Francisco. In addition, her work is in private and corporate collections, including those of Goldman Sachs, Pfizer, Merck, Prudential Life Insurance Corporation, Sabre Corporation, Sunpower Corporation and the William Kaufman Corporation. She is the recipient of the Pollock Krasner awards, Pratt Faculty Development awards, a Fellowship at Experimental Glass Workshop (now Urban Glass) and ED Foundation grants.
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