‘Bright Eyes’
I’ve always loved building with my hands. I remember one of my earliest creations was a tiny snake made from playdough, with the tiniest little teeth pinched into its mouth. Since then, I’ve learned all sorts of art medium but I still find sculpting the most therapeutic and connective work I can create.
My current body of work, including this installation, is a way for me to work through a series of past traumas. Using my skills as an artist, I create corky and pleasurable ways to for me heal, as well as entertain the viewer. I like to manipulate animal instincts, impulses, and behaviors into crude sculptures and playful scenes to simplify my complex emotions into something more digestible. Some pieces are about heartbreak, some are about abuse, and others about fitting into social norms.
This installation is a reference to all the deer I saw as a teenager driving around Ohio, caught all dumbstruck in my headlights, and random, halting anxieties in my current life. I find that animal acts are easily relatable to the human acts I have experienced.
Emlyn Strzempka
is a Seattle based mixed media sculptor. Born and raise in the Midwest, she became creative at an early age using clay and beeswax to sculpt her favorite creatures. Driven by her passion for the arts, she attended Bowling Green State University in Bowling Green, Ohio. There she studied Three-dimensional studies focusing on metals and glass work. She graduated with honors in 2012. Emlyn has worked in renowned studios across the country including Pilchuck Glass School and Pittsburgh Glass Center.
Her early works were mostly based in glass, creating abstract sculptures with copper metal and glass. She has since connected with her childhood roots, sculpting playful animals and creatures in bright colors, and begun creating these objects in different, more accessible mediums.