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      Geometric Scaffolding Structures Geoffrey Todd Smith’s Gouache-and-Ink Portraits

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      “Harmonizing With an Architect” (2025), gouache and ink on paper, 42 1/2 x 60 inches. All images courtesy of the artist and Western Exhibitions, shared with permission

      Geometric Scaffolding Structures Geoffrey Todd Smith’s Gouache-and-Ink Portraits

      April 10, 2025

      Art

      Grace Ebert

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      From the center of a gridded structure made of striped orbs and oblong shapes are two elements redolent of eyes. Seeming to peer out from the largely abstract composition, these facial features are augmented by forms that mimic ears, noses, and mouths all nested within the vivid patterns.

      The work of Chicago-based artist Geoffrey Todd Smith, these ambiguous portraits rendered in gouache and ink reference masks or mirrored reflections, revealing a distant figure without a defined identity. “To be honest, I keep thinking of them as evolving forms,” he tells Colossal. “I try to find new things in them when I look at them. I’m not entirely sure I want to figure them out because I probably won’t want to make them if I understand them.”

      “Picture of Dorian Greige” (2024), gouache and ink on paper, 24 x 22 inches

      Continually drawn to abstraction and geometry, Smith is known for his mesmerizing works that infuse elaborate, often zigzagged motifs with simple structures. Vibrant spheres seem to spill across the paper, creating trippy, symmetric compositions bursting with energy.

      The artist departs from pure abstraction in this new body of work as he incorporates humanoid components amid his interlocked shapes. Geometry still provides a scaffolding, though. He adds:

      If there is a break from logic, that sense of order can quickly collapse, creating tension, sort of like removing the bottom pieces in a game of Jenga. Either way, geometry helps me construct a sort of game board to which I respond with more decorative or ornamental decisions. Even the decorative hand-drawn elements play an optical and structural role. They either assert or interfere with order, depending on how I manipulate them.

      These ornamental additions are the product of a slow, introspective process. Smith prefers not to mix colors and instead layers materials to achieve a particular palette.

      “Medieval Knievel” (2025), gouache and ink on paper, 33 x 29 inches

      “The mark from a gel pen is so immediate and relatable. I like that they were marketed to teenagers because nobody feels quite as deeply as they do at that age,” he says. “I think of the intensity and rigor of my marks as mysterious emoting or like writing a gut-wrenching, abstract love letter.”

      If you’re in Chicago, you can see Smith’s solo show Assembly at Western Exhibitions through April 12. Otherwise, find more of his work on his website and Instagram.

      “Frock Of Regals” (2023), gouache and ink on paper, 22 x 30 inches

      “King Cobralabra” (2024), gouache, acrylic and ink on paper, 24 x 22 inches

      “Beastmaster General” (2024), gouache and ink on paper, 24 x 22 inches

      “Mixed-Message Magician” (2025), acrylic, gouache, and ink on paper, 37 1/2 x 29 inches

      “Chicago Armadillo” (2023), acrylic, gouache, and ink on paper, 30 x 22 1/4 inches

      “Atom Bomb Boom Box” (2023), acrylic, gouache, and ink on paper, 30 x 22 1/4 inches

      “Molotov Pineapple” (2023), acrylic, gouache, and ink on paper, 22 1/4 x 30 inches

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      In Hyperrealistic Oil Paintings, Chloe West Summons Magical Realism in the American West

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      “Gored Cowboy” (2024-25), oil on linen, 84 x 68 inches. All images courtesy of the artist and HARPER’S, New York, shared with permission

      In Hyperrealistic Oil Paintings, Chloe West Summons Magical Realism in the American West

      April 10, 2025

      Art

      Kate Mothes

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      Set against mountains, desert plains, and the cobalt blue skies one finds at high elevations, Chloe West’s striking oil paintings merge Dutch Golden Age iconographies with both mythic and everyday motifs of the American West.

      West was born and raised in Wyoming, the peaks and pastures of which continue to influence her hyperrealistic figurative works. In her current solo exhibition, Games of Chance at HARPER’S, the artist draws on European portraiture and still life traditions in a series of self-portraits and tableaux challenging stereotypes of the West as a frontier molded by machismo.

      “Cowboy Philosopher” (2024-25), oil on linen, 84 x 68 inches

      “Cowboy Philosopher,” for example, portrays the artist in direct confrontation with the viewer, seated beside a mountain lion skull at a table covered with a celestial tapestry. The painting evokes Salomon Koninck’s “A Philosopher” (1635) and works by other Flemish artists of the 17th and 18th centuries, who often depicted alchemists and scholars in their studies accompanied by skulls, devices, and documents.

      West subverts our understanding of cowboy culture as predominantly masculine, juxtaposing her own body with bones, small weapons, and fabric backdrops that establish a tension between life and death, folklore and daily life, and the sacred and the profane. Animal bones, thorns, and knives nod to memento mori, a reminder of the impermanence of life, while also invoking the supernatural and a sense of cyclical time. Casting deep, dark shadows, the glaring sun reveals all.

      Portraying herself in western wear, West bonds to the continuum of the landscape and its customs and narratives while considering the way European attitudes and actions like Manifest Destiny shaped our understanding of the region. The artist taps into legend, history, and magical realism to blur distinctions between the past and contemporary experience. “Ultimately, throughout Games of Chance, West confronts the idealization of frontier heroism, dismantling its pre-established boundaries and expanding upon the legacy it left behind,” the gallery says.

      Games of Chance opens today and continues through May 10 in New York City. Find more on the artist’s website and Instagram.

      “Hand with Opossum Skull” (2024-25), oil on linen, 24 x 20 inches

      Detail of “Gored Cowboy”

      “Trapper’s Still Life” (2024-5), oil on linen, 48 x 38 inches

      “Pearled Back” (2024-25), oil on linen, 58 x 46 inches

      “Portrait with Capped Skull” (2024-25), oil on linen, 58 x 48 inches

      “Pocketknife” (2024), oil on linen, 16 x 12 inches

      “St. Veronica at the Geyser Basin” (2024-25, oil on linen, 48 x 38 inches

      “Hand with Thorn” (2024-25), oil on linen, 24h x 20w in

      Detail of “Cowboy Philosopher”

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      in Street Art

      Martin Wong, Medici of the Aerosol Art Set

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      A patron saw the beauty in graffiti when most of the world thought it was mere nuisance. Now the writing (of Lee Quiñones, Rammellzee, Futura and others) is on the museum wall.Martin Wong got in with the graffiti writers in the early 1980s at Pearl Paint, the long-gone Canal Street art supply store, where he had a job in the canvas department. Wong would slip them markers or cans of spray paint or sell them supplies on deep, unsanctioned discounts, which endeared him to artists at crucial moments of their careers. The painter Lee Quiñones recalls Wong writing out $20 invoices for portrait-quality linens priced at $400.Wong soon began buying Quiñones’s work and that of like-minded painters like Daze, Sharp and A-One — artists who were moving away from bombing trains with graffiti and developing studio practices. In so doing, he nurtured their development and became a constructive patron: a Cosimo de’ Medici of the aerosol set. His collection is highlighted in “Above Ground,” a small but essential exhibition at the Museum of the City of New York.By 1994 Wong had amassed upward of 300 artworks and other media, all of which he donated to the museum that year. As interest in both the modern graffiti movement and its diasporic reverberations has grown, Wong’s conviction has proved consequential, his collection functioning as a repository. Pieces from it have been lent to major institutional surveys, like “Writing the Future: Basquiat and the Hip-Hop Generation” at the MFA Boston and “Art in the Streets” at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles, shows that have deepened scholarship of this previously maligned and misunderstood period.Outsiders had been hot on graffiti at the same time as Wong was, but none had a more ardent or abiding interest. He recognized what was an irreducible form of American expressionism and its importance in the history of New York, even as much of the city was hostile toward it.Wong was 32 when he arrived in New York from San Francisco in 1978 and was drawn immediately to the baroque layers of tags spreading across the city’s surfaces. Wong’s own art, an urban realism that synthesized documentarian detail and romantic devotion (no artist lavished more attention on bricks), had little technical overlap but shared a sympathetic kinship. His paintings referred to the street, and so invariably referred to graffiti too. He reproduced the Lower East Side’s tagged handball courts and crumbling redbrick tenement buildings as oppressive but softened, bathed in a dingy cast that can feel like ecstatic reverie.From left, Wicked Gary, a graffiti writer; Peter Broda, the director of the Museum of American Graffiti; Martin Wong, the collector; and Lazar, a graffiti writer, at the opening of the Museum of American Graffiti in 1989. Behind them is a collection of 1970s writers’ tags.via Museum of the City of New YorkWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      ‘And Then There Was Everything’ Unearths the Allure of Natural Motifs at Joy Machine

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      Jeremy Miranda

      ‘And Then There Was Everything’ Unearths the Allure of Natural Motifs at Joy Machine

      April 9, 2025

      ArtNaturePartner

      Joy Machine

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      Joy Machine is thrilled to announce its second exhibition, And Then There Was Everything, featuring works by Paul S. Briggs, David Cass, Laura Catherwood, Yellena James, Jeremy Miranda, Jeffly Gabriela Molina, and Anna Ortiz. An opening reception will be held from 6 to 9 p.m. on April 18.

      And Then There Was Everything takes its name from the opening line of Richard Powers’ novel The Overstory, which beckons readers into a winding, interconnected narrative tuned into the intimations of the trees. Powers writes that “a good answer must be reinvented many times, from scratch,” a sentiment each artist uniquely investigates through painting, ceramic sculpture, and collage. Iterating on natural motifs, these artists tap into our personal and collective psyches to unearth the recurring messages within.

      Paul Briggs, “Effloresce (Series)” (2025), black stoneware, white cone 6 glaze

      Rendering the familiar unfamiliar has long been a way to investigate the overlooked and to surface hidden emotions, and each artist presents seemingly common subject matter as an invitation to pause and look inward.

      In Briggs’ leafy vessels, repeating motifs are key to achieving equanimity. The artist uses a technique he calls “hand-turning” and works in a “very assertive but tender process.” From a single ball of clay, he pinches small, dynamic fronds surrounding the vessel walls as he finds a meditative balance in both his mind and the sculptures themselves.

      Although working at an intimate scale, Cass zooms outward as he paints undulating waves on antique tins, matchboxes, pulleys, and more, a collection of 14 of which are installed at Joy Machine. Visible swipes of paint delineate the horizon in some pieces, while others are entirely awash in curved lines. Interested in conveying the effects of a heating planet and rising waters, Cass uses repurposed, human-made containers representative of physical constraints as metaphors for our collective limits to adapt.

      In James’ alluring canvases, dense ecosystems spill from edge to edge. Striving for a perfect balance that becomes “a sort of compulsive meditation,” the artist paints delicate, otherworldly environments evocative of both land and sea. Catherwood similarly lingers in uncertainty as she renders hybrid creatures with fantastic motifs. Painted with soft, tender brushstrokes, the arresting beings become welcome companions to explore life’s mysteries and adjust to its cycles.

      Anna Ortiz, “Reflexión” (2024), oil on canvas, 30 x 34 inches

      Ortiz, too, conjures the uncanny in “Reflexión,” a desert landscape dotted with a pair of agave plants underneath an eclipse reflected on Lake Texcoco. The saturated, limited color palette renders the time of day ambiguous and helps establish a surreal borderland in which the now-dried lake still exists. Mixing memory and imagination, Ortiz draws on her own ancestral connections and positions the twin agaves as a way to consider unfulfilled destinies. 

      Miranda and Molina grapple with similar questions as they utilize recollections of moments and spaces. Observation is at the heart of Miranda’s works, and he harnesses the ethereal qualities of light to cast familiar spaces anew. In his hands, a nondescript pocket of forest or humble bonfire becomes dreamlike, prompting questions of perspective and how we understand our relationships to the settings that surround us.

      For Molina, a flutter of yellow butterflies and a mirrored parrot are symbols of connection and care. The brightly colored insects accompany a portrait of the artist’s mother as a child in “Mother Our Castles Will Not Be Made of Sand,” while “To Misericordia” conjures a place long gone. A poem inscribed in the work reads, “… And do you know that glitter and gold have gone out of fashion, and that your parrot no longer remembers himself?,” which references Molina’s great-grandmother’s pet and the ways companions give shape to the self.

      And Then There Was Everything is on view from April 18 to June 7. RSVP to the opening reception here.

      Jeffly Gabriela Molina, “Mother Our Castles Will Not Be Made of Sand” (2020), watercolor on Arches 300 Lb, 23 x 23 inches

      David Cass, “Pulley I – Rockport, ME” (2023-24), oil on marine pulley, 23 x 11.5 x 8 centimeters

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      in Art

      Sebas Velasco’s Dreamy Oil Paintings Illuminate Cinematic Urban Landscapes

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      “Somewhere in Time,” oil on canvas, 195 x 195 centimeters. All images courtesy of Sebas Velasco and the History Museum of Bosnia and Heregovina, shared with permission

      Sebas Velasco’s Dreamy Oil Paintings Illuminate Cinematic Urban Landscapes

      April 9, 2025

      Art

      Kate Mothes

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      Sebas Velasco (previously) has long been drawn to the landscapes and cultures of the Balkans and former Yugoslavian countries in southeastern Europe, where he has spent the past decade traveling and researching for his large-scale paintings and murals.

      The Morning Will Change Everything at the History Museum of Bosnia and Heregovina marks the Spanish artist’s first institutional exhibition. Inspired by the title of a song by Sarajevo-based band Indexi, the show continues Velasco’s exploration of urban landscapes and themes of relationships and passing time.

      “Wherever I May Roam,” oil on canvas, 195 x 195 centimeters

      Rendered in oil on wood or canvas, Velasco’s paintings depict figures, architecture, and old cars illuminated by street lamps or headlights in a realistic yet dreamlike world. Taking cues from photography through the use of cinematic lighting effects and portraiture, he often juxtaposes contrasting elements like grassy meadows with brutalist high-rises or derelict cars with wildflowers.

      Whether glowing under an orange street light or spotlit against a fuzzy smattering of brake lights and apartment windows, Velasco’s subjects are relaxed, poised, and unhurried. One can imagine the din of car horns, music, and other city noises in the background, yet Velasco emphasizes brief, self-assured interactions as if momentarily, time is at a standstill.

      Nighttime plays a starring role in Velasco’s compositions, which tap into dualities of the known and unknown, revelations and secrets, individuality and anonymity, and the quotidian and the extraordinary. He conjures “gateways to complex socio-economic narratives,” the museum says, emphasizing the power of humanity amid ever-evolving identities and the tumult of globalization.

      Find more on Velasco’s website and Instagram.

      Detail of “Wherever I May Roam”

      “Golf II,” oil on wood, 41 x 27 centimeters

      “The Morning Will Change Everything,” oil on wood, 120 x 120 centimeters

      “Agata,” oil on wood, 81 x 65 centimeters

      Detail of “Agata”

      “Yugo 45 III,” oil on wood, 24 x 35 centimeters

      “Interior Night Sarajevo II,” oil on wood, 46 x 33 centimeters

      Velasco working on a painting in his solo exhibition at the History Museum of Bosnia and Heregovina

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      in Art

      Hundreds of Fantastic Creatures Inhabit a Sprawling Universe by Vorja Sánchez

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      Detail of “Late At Night.” All images courtesy of Vorja Sánchez, shared with permission

      Hundreds of Fantastic Creatures Inhabit a Sprawling Universe by Vorja Sánchez

      April 8, 2025

      Art

      Grace Ebert

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      In Organic Harmony, curious, hybrid insects and wide-eyed furry creatures populate a world of natural textures and surreal intrigue. Vorja Sánchez (previously) has been dreaming up the fanciful series for the last year and a half, which he debuts at Beinart Gallery later this month.

      Inspired by the diversity of the forest and the vivid drawings of German biologist Ernst Haeckel, Sánchez imagines a vast ecosystem. He’s particularly drawn to patterns and employs similar motifs to create cohesion across multiple pieces. Soft, fluffy fur, slender leaves with curled tips, and gleaming eyes attached to unexpected body parts appear in several of his works.

      “Ancient Tales”

      Sánchez shares that by studying recurring patterns in nature, he’s learned to identify the biological purpose of many shapes and forms, which influence how he selects a particular characteristic for a single creature. The artist adds:

      There’s a harmony in what might seem like randomness, and above all, nature doesn’t care about scale or importance—everything exists on the same level and is balanced. It’s a concept that fascinates me and serves as a profound metaphor for life.

      A mix of graphite, ink, watercolor, gouache, spray paint, and more layer together in this sprawling collection to create what Sánchez calls “a fluid dialogue” between the materials and motifs. “There were moments when the creative process for each piece was like trying to remember a dream,” he says. “When you attempt to complete these hazy images, your memory transforms into something more intricate and elusive.” Rather than impose an aesthetic direction on the creatures, the artist prefers to let the blotting, drippy nature of the materials prevail.

      Organic Harmony runs from April 26 to May 18 in Brunswick. Find more on Instagram.

      “Insect Dialogue”

      Detail of “Insect Dialogue”

      “The Sound of Cotton”

      Detail of “The Sound of Cotton”

      “Organic Findings”

      “Late At Night”

      Detail of “Organic Findings”

      “Elixir”

      “Hazy Memories of Nocturnal Visitors”

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      in Art

      vanessa german Channels Metaphysical Healing Powers in a Series of Monumental Assemblages

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      “the siddhi of the soul” (2025), rose quartz, wood, plaster, plaster gauze, the shine of the full moon on my mother’s face while saving my sister’s life, pyrite, joy, the ecstasy of creativity, marble tile, astroturf, for how it is to know that you are but a splinter of the whole and also entirely whole the same time, a revelation of lapis, citrine, the way that clouds are creative, a loosing against old ways of power, a healing
      song sung just of breath and now-ness, amethyst, 3 quilts and the love of jill and Dev, the hands
      of dev, the hands of jordan, the hands of our collective soul, strawberry quartz, fish key chains, a mammy creamer in the eye, hematite, butterflies made by the artist, a muse against cruelty,
      for how it is to be alive inside of this holy soul, magic., 65 x 36 1/2 x 36 1/2 inches. All images © vanessa german, courtesy of the artist and Kasmin, New York, shared with permission

      vanessa german Channels Metaphysical Healing Powers in a Series of Monumental Assemblages

      April 8, 2025

      ArtSocial Issues

      Kate Mothes

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      Meaning “perfection” or “attainment,” the Sanskrit word siddhi describes a kind of powerful spiritual energy attained through meditation and mindfulness. To be a siddha is to be accomplished—to achieve a level of optimum spiritual wellbeing. For vanessa german (previously), making sculpture is a spiritual practice with the power to confront systemic social issues and conjure a sense of community.

      In GUMBALL—there is absolutely no space between body and soul, german’s solo exhibition at Kasmin, “the siddhi of the soul,” for example, lists rose quartz, wood, plaster, and marble tile along with “…the way that clouds are creative, a loosing against old ways of power, a healing song sung just of breath and now-ness…”

      “the emergence, or, on considering the transformative nature of the dragon fly as told by Richard Rudd.” (2025), we dance here don’t we bend out our bones and loose our spirts free in an agreement of birth and suffering, wood, plaster, plaster gauze, lapis, sodalite, blue kyanite, quartz, rose quartz, dyed howlite, turquoise, bottles, blue things at the bottom of the sea, languishing, morganite, blue amber eye bee—for seeing the unseen inside of your own self, the deep grief of it all , the light from the wound, blue pigments, a white snake for transformation, a solid fearlessness, grace, onyx, obsidian, rhinestones, cut glass, a host of possibilities, magic and loving that keeps making itself new, over and over again., 64 x 40 x 38 inches

      german’s monumental new series of sculptural heads are conceived as “cosmic maps, proposing a cartography for a sacred place that embraces the full creative potential of all people,” says an exhibition statement. Drawing inspiration from ancient Mesoamerican Olmec heads, which were carved from basalt and measure, in some cases, more than 11 feet tall, the artist channels heft and gravitas.

      The descriptions of her pieces are a far cry from standardized lists of raw materials; combining lyrical and autobiographical references, the accompanying texts complement each work’s inspiration, process, and inherent energy.

      Beads, glass, ceramics, wood, recycling, astroturf, found objects, and more are complemented by myriad emotions and memories like “joy,” “languishing,” and “the way that black girls—in my youth—could speak their own language by chewing and popping gum.” She incorporates minerals and stones like quartz, onyx, and obsidian, transmitting their metaphysical healing properties.

      The exhibition is organized into two complementary presentations, including the mixed-media heads and a series of fallen figures. The latter strike poses that reflect vogue dancers’ “death drops” in ballroom competitions, in which they fall to the floor as if mimicking death, then use one leg to bounce back up.

      Title TBD (2025), 36 x 24 x 14 inches

      The fallen figures’ heads are replaced with porcelain racist caricatures, “reclaiming power from their white counterparts,” says a statement. Mirroring the voguing technique, each dancer emphatically rebounds from not only the illusion of death but from bigotry, systematic oppression, and violence toward the LGBTQ+ community and those who interrogate social norms.

      GUMBALL—there is absolutely no space between body and soul continues through May 10 across two of Kasmin’s Chelsea locations in New York City. Explore more on german’s Instagram.

      Detail of “the emergence, or, on considering the transformative nature of the dragon fly as told by
      Richard Rudd.”

      “lover, lover, lover boi” (2025), arm trans women, existence cannot be non-existence, get over it, love, love, love, wood, plaster, plaster gauze, bottle cap chain, forgiveness, clear quartz, cut glass, titanium dyed geodes, onyx, obsidian, shungite, Smokey quartz, beaded glass trim, the grief always, the opposite of self loathing, a Native American beaded hat from a trading post near what we now call, “the Grand Canyon.” Heat, starlight, the dance of all ages, kissing and fucking for the peace and joy of it all, anatomical heart model, mammy note pad body with original pencil, cut glass ring holder, quartz points from the land we now call, “Arkansas”, cowboy salt shaker, a snake for the bite and shrugging off of the passage of time., 77 x 31 x 34 inches

      “you own soul is a true magic” (2025), wood, marble tile, love, red glass beads, rose quartz, onyx, obsidian, shungite, Smokey quartz, lapis, agate, candelabras, joy, a found wooden foot, ceramic birds, pyrite, sodalite, emerald with quartz, black beaded text, sitting down in the soul for a made-up song, mirror, amethyst, beaded key chains from guatamala, astroturf, agate, morganite, creativity as antidote, silence, dancing, forgiveness., 70 x 43 x 36 1/4 inches

      Detail of “you own soul is a true magic”

      Title TBD (2025), 26 x 16 x 11 inches

      “GUMBALL, or, Gloriously Underestimated Magical Bounty As Living Love. Or, An Invitation to Contemplation at the pace of One’s own Divine Soul.” (2025), gemstones and minerals: tigers eye, onyx, obsidian, rose quartz, morganite, lapis, aragonite, citrine, agate, dyed jade, titanium heated geode, spirit quartz. Cut glass crystal, fish key chains, a love song to the Soul of it all, a house in which to grow wise in a manner with allows no violation to the being, wood, hand blown glass gumball, ceramic figurine, pink prayer beads, prayers of grace and the intimacy of loneliness giving into the knowing of deep and true wholeness, light, astroturf, joyous angelic presence, the levity of the Buddha—HA HA. Love, memories of my grandmother, plaster, plaster guaze, cardboard, obsidian lucky foot, 3-4 bags of my/the artist’s recycling, a laying on of hands and a release into the grace of being held outside of one’s own mind, joy, ceramic butterflies, the way that black girls—in my youth—could speak their own language by chewing and popping gum, beaded flowers, hope, newness, porcelain tile, slow down, it’s going to be ok., 87 x 47 1/2 x 43 1/2 inches

      Detail of “GUMBALL, or, Gloriously Underestimated Magical Bounty As Living Love. Or, An Invitation to Contemplation at the pace of One’s own Divine Soul.”

      Title TBD (2025), 36 x 22 x 14 inches

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      in Art

      Laura Ellen Bacon Brings Somerset Willow ‘Into Being’ at Yorkshire Sculpture Park

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      Detail of “Into Being.” All photos by India Hobson. Images courtesy of the artist and Yorkshire Sculpture Park, shared with permission

      Laura Ellen Bacon Brings Somerset Willow ‘Into Being’ at Yorkshire Sculpture Park

      April 7, 2025

      Art

      Kate Mothes

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      From pliable lengths of sustainably sourced Somerset willow, Laura Ellen Bacon (previously) weaves elegant, meandering sculptures. Whether installed on a wall, streaming from windows, or curled up on a plinth, her works invite us to wander through installations that appear alive and moving.

      Bacon’s latest solo exhibition, Into Being, just opened at Yorkshire Sculpture Park. The Derbyshire-based artist created pieces for the park’s 18th-century chapel, centering around an eponymous piece that extends six meters into the nave and reaches three meters high. Mirroring shapes from nature like seed pods, burrows, and cocoons, the undulating form welcomes visitors to step inside a kind of gentle, organic embrace.

      The artist with “Into Being”

      Joining a continuum of artists like Andy Goldsworthy—who has four works permanently on display ay YSP—Nicola Turner, and Kate MccGwire who utilize natural materials to create enigmatic in situ installations, Bacon’s site-specific works respond directly to their surroundings. She constructed “Into Being” on location at YSP over the course of eight weeks, re-interpreting the space by “drawing” with willow. About 80 bundles of Dicky Meadow, a variety known for its slender and straight stem, wind their way through the gallery

      In Britain, people have been weaving with willow for upwards of 10,000 years, primarily using the material for creating baskets. The thin stems are soft, flexible, and lightweight, making them easy to handle and bend. Bacon has developed her own methods during the past two decades, experimenting with relationships between curves and lines, tightness and looseness, and knots and twists to create contemporary, abstract compositions.

      Branches that have naturally fallen from beech trees at YSP form part of the sculpture’s supporting structure, which, “through its material and form, conjures up a primal instinct to nest and reconnect with the natural world,” says a statement. When the installation is dismantled later this year, the material will be repurposed on the YSP grounds to create wildlife habitats.

      Into Being continues through September 7 in West Bretton, England. Find more on Bacon’s website and Instagram.

      “Contact”

      Detail of “Contact”

      “Into Being”

      Detail of “Into Being”

      Detail of “Into Being”

      “Confidant”

      Detail of “Into Being”

      Detail of “Into Being”

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