An Exhibition Invitation from Japan Prompted Coleen Sterritt to Work in a Different Scale
Sterritt also has shown her smaller sculptures in several recent group exhibitions in the U.S.
Burp, 2020 (Found natural object, rubber gloves, spray foam, paint, 13.5 by 18 by 14 inches)
Coleen Sterritt, ’79 MFA Fine Arts
In January of 2019, I was invited to participate in a group exhibition at the Tokyo Metropolitan Art Museum in Japan. This prompted me to create sculptures on a much smaller scale than my usual, life-size work. I presented three pedestal pieces in Tokyo and have sporadically continued to work in this scale since then. These smaller works have been included in a slew of recent group exhibitions, where I’ve exhibited with some fabulous artists in both artist-run spaces and commercial galleries. These include Irvine Fine Arts Center, Space Ten in Hawthorne, King Studio in Venice, Goat Gallery in Landers, Berkshire Botanical Garden in Massachusetts, Tufenkian Fine Arts in Glendale, and Traywick Contemporary in Berkeley.
My methodology is such that I keep an ever-evolving collection of leftovers in my studio: garden debris, found furniture, thrift store finds, and choice scraps from older, deconstructed sculptures. There’s also an abundance of more traditional remnants such as wood, plaster, fabric, wire, and even photographic images. Despite my formal knowledge of art materials, when I harvest these, I’m never quite sure how they will be used. I only know they trigger a visceral response in me. They suggest a set of visual circumstances that challenge my understanding of the natural world. Their presence in my space asks that I reconfigure my understanding of the world I live in. They demand that I re-animate the interplay between my world and theirs: the man-made world versus the natural world. The results can be sensuous, elegant, clunky, messy, awkward, and humorous as the interplay of form, material, and color evokes opposing considerations and questions our ideas of beauty and perfection. I consider the works to be poetic mashups of contemporary life.
Hands & Feet, 2020 (Bamboo, rubber gloves, cardboard, duct tape, and shellac, 20 by 13 by 11 inches)
LongTall, 2021 (Wood, bamboo, dried gourd, vinyl, ink, acrylic paint, 25.5 by 12 by 12 inches)
SweePea, 2022 (Wood, found natural objects, rubber gloves, spray foam, paint, ink, 29 by 22 by 12 inches)
Some Kinda Wonderful, 2022 (Wood, found natural objects, spray foam, paint, ink, 44 by12 by 14 inches)
Sterritt’s work is included in public and private collections, including the Los Angeles County Museum of Art and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles. She has received a John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship, a City of Los Angeles Individual Artist Fellowship (COLA) grant, a J. Paul Getty Trust Fund for the Visual Arts/California Community Foundation award, and a National Endowment for the Arts grant, among others. You can read more about Sterritt on her website, and follow her on Instagram, @coleen.sterritt.
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