There’s a practice called Tikkun Olam, the repair of the world, that I often think of while I am making art. The repair can be using found materials and reusing materials, to lessen the impact of resource consumption from the earth. It can also be addressing inequities through words and images.
Each body of work presented here, nearly a lifetime of making, approaches this challenge of being present, looking at details and pulling back into perspective. This could mean observing and connecting the invisible such as science, the geometry of space, and textiles. It emerges as an awareness of words used to describe situations, objects, or a play with words that asks for a connection with the viewer. Often there is a blurring between art and life, politics, landscape and spirituality. This is the core of my process and motive.
Anna Shapiro is an artist and catalyst with a continuous studio practice for over 30 years.
She has catalyzed many creative industries in Boston and Rhode Island including directing art spaces, teaching metal arts, running festivals, helping to manage alternative grocery stores and avant-gardening in mobile hydroponic trailers. She works within a unique community of experienced makers. Anna’s public art experience is varied reflecting many large-scale events, performance interventions and sculptural installations, drawing on her skills in creative thinking in conjunction with her pragmatism and life experience.
Her work connects social and ecological issues that have been important to her since her early employment as a wilderness guide, National Park Ranger, early GIS innovator and environmental activist. Anna has received awards and residencies in Vermont, New York, Brazil and Latvia, has spoken on panels about iron casting and eco-feminism and has published articles on these topics. Anna’s broad abilities in mixed media, large scale site specificity, and her project leadership, team building and ability to connect between trades, creatives and community groups has led to successful completion of projects with artistic merit, and community connection.
Anna’s work incorporates metal, textiles, everyday materials and found objects into her ink drawings, collages, sculptures, installations and performances. Former public artworks have used the scale of parking lots and National Parks as her canvas. She chooses to create unusual interventions using art in unexpected ways by using materials that are common and unremarkable, transforming them into a tangible social commentary that prioritizes a human scale and relevance.
CV Upon Request