Artist Statement for Junior Seminar

I have always been interested in functioning things. For as long as I can remember I have loved to work with my hands. I have worked with family members who have had wood and metal shops. I was intrigued from a young age about making things with your hands and the endless possibilities that you have. These experiences are what initially sparked my interest in art, and more specifically fabrication. I went to work at a race shop after high school. There I learned how to weld and form sheet metal. I really enjoyed the process of working with metal and knew that I wanted to base my career around metalwork and art.

Now that I am in school working towards a degree in studio art I have found that I am fascinated by functional artwork. For my seminar class I was very interested in making a four piece body of work that consists of chairs made out of found materials. I used the skills that I have learned from previous classes to achieve this. An important part of this body of work was that I wanted to challenge myself to use only the materials that were available to me. I only used purchased materials when there was no other option. Throughout this process I have been very passionate about creating these chairs and am glad that I chose to use found objects instead of raw materials. It was really interesting to plan and produce these pieces because I had to work around the fact that I was limited. The meaning behind the work is that there are opportunities to create awesome things all around us. All it takes is imagination and persistence to reach the end goal. I have really enjoyed the process of making these pieces and plan to continue to make functional artwork from found objects.