Brief Review ‣ Creator(s): Ellen Jewett. Nationality: Canadian. Base: Cowichan Valley, British Columbia, Canada. Main skill(s): anthropology; exotic animal care; fine art; medical illustration; sculpture; stop motion animation. ★ Main thematic(s) and/or subject(s) in this/these work(s): the crucial role of plants and animals in the foundations of culture, sustenance, and identity; nostalgia; fragility; anthrozoology meeting psychoanalysis as themes of natural beauty; curiosity; colonialism; domestication; death; growth; visibility; and wildness as remarkably alien and indifferent. Main style(s) and/or art reference(s) applied: Allegory, Fantastic Art, Figurative Art, Nature Art, Surrealism, Symbolism. Main medium(s): cold porcelain; mixed media; polymer clay. ★ More info: Website Facebook Instagram Pinterest Twitter Tumblr H/T: Colossal Bored Panda My Modern Met
Plants and animals have always been the surface on which humans have etched the foundations of culture, sustenance, and identity. For myself, natural forms are a continual source of fascination and deep aesthetic pleasure. At first glance, my work explores the more modern prosaic concept of nature: a source of serene nostalgia but this is balanced with the more visceral experience of ‘wildness’ as remarkably alien and indifferent. Upon closer inspection of each ‘creature’, the viewer may discover a frieze on which themes as familiar as domestication and as abrasive as domination fall into sharp relief.
Ellen Jewett
