Featured Artist Bonnie Shanas

Enjoy the amazing sculptural work of artist Bonnie Shanas, and visit her website to see more of this talented artist’s portfolio.

 

 

Figurative art is often described as the artist’s representation of an existing source. My goal as a figurative sculptor is to not only to deliver a new representation of the human form, but to convey the essence of the emotion within. I try to capture our intimate moments, unbound from any single identity, making them open to all.

 

 

I have always been intrigued in how our emotional nature is expressed in our body language. Therefore, most of my inspiration comes from observing people in our day to day lives and reading the raw messages which are communicated through expressions and motions, rather than phrases and words.

 

 

My studies and work experience are of a business oriented background, however I have always been drawn to art. In 2006 I decided to change life’s course and respectively closed the “office door” and entered the “studio”.

 

 

I suppose that it is in the realm of figurative sculpture that I can best combine my right and left brain qualities. Figurative sculpture requires a very methodical and precise approach, yet at the same time evokes my creativity and imagination.

 

 

While most forms of sculpture are additive or reductive, I enjoy the challenge of manipulating a form out of an existing sheet, where no material can be added or removed and no crease erased. Drawing from a sketch, photo or memory, I form the figure free hand. There are no molds or casts in the creation process. I use minimal tools, such as a wooden knife to create the creases and firm the forms once complete.

 

 

Having explored various mediums, I continue to find wire mesh a unique and challenging material.  With more space than matter, there is a lightness and transparency that is as suggestive as is a shadow, yet its metal-like hardness gives substance to the ethereal form and the affirmation of its enduring presence.