Elin Christopherson

Artist's Statement

An idea impels me to explore it’s meaning for a time. I often combine several threads that run through my ideas, and it is this combination that synthesizes new ideas and forms.

There lies a tension between the modern human effect on the natural world and the often unappreciated depth of human dependence on that world. Early 20th century technology, which reflected the hand and mind of the inventor, is ignored and undervalued today. I combine both mechanical and natural elements into handmade objects which spell a heritage through a crafts tradition.

I play with a sense of unseen energy, purpose and movement: a collection device, a distillery, a repository, a lightning rod to receive, a stinger to pierce, a bundle or cluster of emerging tips, radial circling, gravity pulling material to settle in the bottom of the designed object.

Glass reveals otherwise hidden interiors: A look inside at form stripped of flesh, what one finds when an object is cut open, or what is left when the surface is peeled away, a living thing that bleeds when cut and how that secretion can have its own growth of form.

I choose salvaged natural materials. My goal is to seek out certain elements that I believe have been overlooked, and celebrate the intrinsic worth of these hidden elements in the health of both human and natural systems.

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Work by This Artist