Laura Grimm (she/her) is a Rotterdam based sculptor who graduated from the Textiles Department at the Gerrit Rietveld Academy in Amsterdam. Since then, she has been making large, abstract sculptures using a variety of tactile materials. A few years ago she started working with sheep’s wool from local shepherds - this has been her material of choice ever since.
The raw materials and processing methods of objects in our daily lives are often invisible. Due to her education in textiles, where raw fibres were key, Grimm has a special connection with these types of invisible processes. That is why her sculptures are made using wool directly from sheep in Rotterdam. Grimm attends the shearing after which she washes, cards and dyes the wool using flowers and plants, before felting the fibres into large, colourful sculptures. These sculptures retain bits of grass, dirt and other natural traces, which leaves the origin of her materials - the lives of animals and plants - visible within her work.
‘I twirl a pencil – a magic wand lathed from incense cedar – between my fingers. The willow bark in the aspirin. Even the metal of my lamp asks me to consider its roots in the strata of the earth. But I notice that my eyes and my thoughts pass quickly over the plastic on my desk. I hardly give the computer a second glance. I can muster no reflective moment for plastic. It is so far removed from the natural world. I wonder if that’s a place where the disconnection began, the loss of respect, when we could no longer see the life within an object.’ – Robin Wall Kimmerer, Braiding Sweetgrass
Though the materials remain traceable and recognizable, the emergence of the forms for her sculptures is deliberately mysterious. Grimm's process includes drawing on large sheets of paper, collaging with various materials and associative writing. While developing a sculpture, she fills her studio with these visual media, creating a world of forms, thoughts and new relations. From this world the shapes of her sculptures arise naturally. Because of this process, the visual origin of her sculptures is not clearly defined, and people can give their own unique meaning to them. With these free forms made of traceable materials, Grimm wants to encourage others to develop new perspectives and attitudes towards the natural world and apply them for a better future.
Matthijs Schouten
Een Gemeenschap van Leven
Laura Grimm (she/her) is a Rotterdam based sculptor who graduated from the Textiles Department at the Gerrit Rietveld Academy in Amsterdam. Since then, she has been making large, abstract sculptures using a variety of tactile materials. A few years ago she started working with sheep’s wool from local shepherds - this has been her material of choice ever since.
The raw materials and processing methods of objects in our daily lives are often invisible. Due to her education in textiles, where raw fibres were key, Grimm has a special connection with these types of invisible processes. That is why her sculptures are made using wool directly from sheep in Rotterdam. Grimm attends the shearing after which she washes, cards and dyes the wool using flowers and plants, before felting the fibres into large, colourful sculptures. These sculptures retain bits of grass, dirt and other natural traces, which leaves the origin of her materials - animals and plants - visible within her work.
‘I twirl a pencil – a magic wand lathed from incense cedar – between my fingers. The willow bark in the aspirin. Even the metal of my lamp asks me to consider its roots in the strata of the earth. But I notice that my eyes and my thoughts pass quickly over the plastic on my desk. I hardly give the computer a second glance. I can muster no reflective moment for plastic. It is so far removed from the natural world. I wonder if that’s a place where the disconnection began, the loss of respect, when we could no longer see the life within an object.’ – Robin Wall Kimmerer, Braiding Sweetgrass
Though the materials remain traceable and recognizable, the emergence of the forms for her sculptures is deliberately mysterious. Grimm's process includes drawing on large sheets of paper, collaging with various materials and associative writing. While developing a sculpture, she fills her studio with these visual media, creating a world of forms, thoughts and new relations. From this world the shapes of her sculptures arise naturally. Because of this process, the visual origin of her sculptures is not clearly defined, and people can give their own unique meaning to them. With these free forms made of traceable materials, Grimm wants to encourage others to develop new perspectives and attitudes towards the natural world and apply them for a better future.
Matthijs Schouten | Een Gemeenschap van Leven