Laura Ellen Bacon
Rooted in Instinct
21 Oct 2017 – 14 Jan 2018
Main Gallery
Over the Autumn / Winter of 2017-18, The National Centre for Craft & Design was proud to present Rooted in Instinct — what was a new collection of work developed especially for NCCD by Women’s Hour Craft Prize nominee and British Sculptor, Laura Ellen Bacon.
Rooted in Instinct was a unique exhibition demonstrating an evolution of the intuitive making process that has dominated Bacon’s practice up to that point. It was a pivotal moment in the artist’s career featuring unexpected and familiar forms in willow and new explorations in thatch, further developing the possibilities of traditional hand weaving and knotting techniques. In response to NCCD’s history as an old seed warehouse, the new abstract sculptures created height, density and detail, the forms are all at once majestic, immersive and ‘protective’ with a unique sense of connectivity to the heritage crafts and architecture of the Lincolnshire landscape.
I am really fuelled up, I always have been. And I used to describe this feeling as having a rocket pack on my back, and knowing I’ve got a long way to go, but having this force behind me. And I still feel that, and I’m very grateful for that.
Laura Ellen Bacon
BBC Radio 4 Woman’s Hour
During Laura’s solo exhibition here at NCCD she was also part of the inaugural Woman’s Hour Craft Prize in association with the Crafts Council and the V&A. Laura was been shortlisted along with 11 other renowned craft practitioners.
Learn more about the Woman’s Hour Craft Prize and the other finalists here.
Working with predominately natural materials and her bare hands, her works embrace, surround or engulf architectural and natural structures. She is inspired by the unpredictability of nature and the way it moves into the built environment, like a bird nesting in traffic lights.
About the Artist
Laura Ellen Bacon is a British sculptor who has worked with willow and natural materials for over 15 years to create large-scale or ‘human-scale’ artworks in landscape, urban and interior settings.
Ellen Bacon’s particular use of materials emerges from a compulsive desire to work them into a formed space of some kind, using a language of materials that seems strangely familiar to the natural world.
The Derbyshire-born daughter of an architect and granddaughter of a joiner, Ellen Bacon always had an inclination and insight into buildings and materials. From ages 11 – 18 years Ellen Bacon built a two-storey treehouse spanning 5 trees, using surplus wood given to her by her grandfather upon his retirement. She describes this as a “creative frenzy” and one of the most creative times in her life.
Ellen Bacon studied Applied Arts at the University of Derby, exploring different materials such as ceramics and metal. It wasn’t until her final year, when her tutors allowed her to work with willow on a big scale, that she rekindled this passion reminiscent of her treehouse project.
Ellen Bacon begins with two sticks of willow at a time, often building structures around herself as the work progresses. This is a very organic process and she can literally feel the work growing.
Within and beyond the UK, Ellen Bacon’s work is created for both private, business and public spaces and has been seen in places such as Chatsworth, Somerset House, New Art Centre and Saatchi Gallery. Her work has also been included within curated events for Sotheby’s, the Jerwood Space, COLLECT and Bloomberg. Publications including Country Life, Wall Street Journal and Financial Times have detailed her work.
It seems impossible to look at Bacon’s sculptures without asking how they have been made. Their apparent simplicity of form is deceptive and we see on closer inspection that they consist of a complicated system of knots and weaves, allowing us to consider their inner structure as well as their outward appearance in much the same way as we regard the pierced, hollow forms of Hepworth and Moore.
Stephen Feeke, Director at New Art Centre, Roche Court