SCULPTURE

Nature is constantly evolving, shifting, transforming; an artist needs to embrace this process in order to breathe life into a given work of art. My larger scale sculptures are the result of many years of creating, experimenting, building, destroying and adapting. They are the visual narrative of my progression as an artist both in and out of studio.

Jennifer Peters

My work embraces the direction a given work wants to go, rather than trying to control the outcome. It gives freedom; the freedom to fall, to be broken, refined, mended, imperfect, re-assembled. Assembling the broken pieces of our stories, our souls, our bodies … embracing, rather than rejecting the reality of death, decay, loss. These are the driving forces beneath my work and the elements to which I am perpetually drawn. The beautiful weight of stone, the exquisite hue of a weathered saw, the texture of a discarded railway tie. These are stunning and I cannot walk by and ignore what has been discarded as hopeless, useless … junk. 

I lost my son Anthony seven years ago. He died while I was nursing him in the woods; his body went still, his skin became white and one slow trickle of blood ran down his exquisite face. I loved him like no other and he was gone in a moment, as was any illusion I had of control. We have no control. Life, nature is wild, untameable, flawless. It is a force beyond any we have the capacity to know or understand. I cannot look at creation and refuse to believe there is a creator, an entity greater than myself at work. While we may never comprehend the why; we can trust that the broken fragments of our lives can be woven together into a gorgeous tapestry infinitely more beautiful than what came before.  

There is life after loss. There is joy after pain. And there is new life waiting to spring from the ashes of what came before if we can learn to accept and embrace every aspect within the landscape of our lives. My work embraces the direction a given work wants to go, rather than trying to control the outcome. It gives freedom; the freedom to fall, to be broken, refined, mended, imperfect, re-assembled … it is finding the inherent beauty within each and every object, emotion or experience. It is my journey to begin anew and the tapestry of my soul.