Monica Wyatt

"I first realized my love for visual storytelling when I began producing and directing television shows. Starting with the writer’s script, my palette was everything seen through the camera’s lens: actors, movement, light, and mood. Shot by shot, I wove together these images into two-dimensional dramas. I longed, however, to tell my own stories, to move beyond words and pictures, and to explore themes that ignited my imagination. My sculptures and assemblages became the three-dimensional stories I wanted to tell; stories about relationships, childhood, time passage, marriage, motherhood, and secrets never told. My sculpting process always begins with a tiny bit of clay to which I add more, never knowing how any piece will end. I don’t use models when I sculpt, nor am I interested in replicating what I see. Instead, I’m consumed with abstracting the human figure in voluminous, whimsical sensuality, wrestling with the complexities of three-dimensional form, and hunting for each piece’s happy accidents, emotion, and grace. In my assemblage work, I draw inspiration from rusty, crusty, and abandoned objects, always maintaining a sculptor’s awareness of volume and texture. I encourage viewers to allow their imaginations to be jostled, to look, and look again at the reimagined compositions, perhaps catching reflections of their own stories."