Sculptors @ American Fine Craft Show @ the Brooklyn Museum

Sculptors using wire mesh, leather, ceramics, metal armature and paper, whose work captures human forms, dresses, mythic figures, and movement, will join artists and artisans in the Beaux-Arts Court at the 5th American Fine Craft Show Brooklyn at the Brooklyn Museum Nov. 18-19.

• Bonnie Shanas, Cherry Hill, N.J., who is intrigued by the human form, dance and movement, wrote on her website: “While most forms of sculpture are additive or reductive, I enjoy the challenge of breathing life into a sheet of steel wire mesh, where no material can be added or removed, and no crease erased. The lightness and transparency of the mesh offers simplicity to the gestures and a feeling of lightness to the movement, while the hardness of the metal promises that the moment captured continues well beyond its fragment of time.”
• For Lila Turjanski-Villard, sculpture and dance have been life passions since childhood. The Yorktown Heights, N.Y.-based sculptor said: “The memories of dance are stamped in my pieces. The themes of movement, space and communication are constantly present in my artwork. I like to explore the suggestions of bodies in communication, in movement and in rhythm with space.” she has developed a technique using layers of different materials including metal armature and paper that is painted and coated with a protective sealer.
• Renée Chase Cloth2Clay wrote: “I am a fashion designer and my medium is clay. She creates dresses in clay and said “a dress is a symbol of time, place, culture and self. Choice in dress becomes a representation of image, emotion, experience and fantasy.” The Collingswood, N.J. sculptor added: “I ask the viewer to see the imaginary woman inside of the sculpture – to define her persona. I extend myself to creating replicas of wedding dresses because each sculpture captures an irreplaceable moment in time and reflects a capstone life experience.”
• In her Roxbury, Mass. studio, Wendy Ellertson creates mythical sculptural leather and mixed media figures like dragons and a species she calls Taradiddles, to encourage creativity and story telling. She has compared her process of creating art to jazz improvisation. “I frequently start with an object - a stone, a piece of wood, an old textile. For me, these objects have stories embedded in them. My job is to let that story out, or to see what new story evolves from working with the object.” She said: “With so many serious issues to deal with in the world today, these small one-of-a-kind ‘pretentious nonsense’ figures help remind one to stop, take a breath, do a dance step or two and get a little perspective before moving forward with new energy.”

Tickets to the craft show include general admission to the Brooklyn Museum. Some of the concurrent exhibitions include: “Rodin at the Brooklyn Museum: The Body in Bronze,” that opens November 17; “Soulful Creatures: Animal Mummies in Ancient Egypt;” “Proof: Francisco Goya, Sergei Eisenstein, Robert Longo,” and “Arts of Korea.”

For more information, visit www.brooklyncraftshow.com. Hours November 18 & 19, 11 a.m. - 6 p.m. Directions: Brooklyn Museum, 200 Eastern Parkway, Brooklyn, NY 11238. https://www.brooklynmuseum.org/visit/directions.php