Laura Ellen Bacon: Rejuvenation
The Denver Art Museum opens a new installation, Rejuvenation, by British artist Laura Ellen Bacon. Bacon is renowned for transforming raw, natural materials by hand into sculptures in both interior and landscape settings. Rejuvenation, measuring over 20ft. in height and made of more than 500 lbs. of willow branches, will be on view at the museum from 23 June 2024, through autumn 2024.
Image: Artist portrait. Portrait by Alun Callender. Image above: Rêverie, a temporary exhibit for Département de L’Eure en Normandie at Château-Gaillard as part of Journées Européenes du Patrimonie 2023. Stripped willow. Photo by Laura Ellen Bacon.
As the artist explains, Rejuvenation was inspired by the organic growth of the willow plant, whose root system’s ability to store water equates to the inherent power of life and regrowth. The installation will climb along the large, four-story wall in the museum’s Hamilton Building atrium. Its organic shapes will embrace, surround, and engulf the building’s architectural structures, encouraging visitors to experience their environment in a different way.
Image: Inundation, 2014. Ruthin Craft Centre, Wales, UK. Flanders Red Willow. Photo by Dewi Tannatt Lloyd.
The daughter of an architect father and a fruit grower mother, Bacon grew up on a farm in Derbyshire County, UK, where the artist still lives and works. Her surroundings and upbringing continue to inform her work through her site-specific creations that explore the relationship between natural and human-made environments.
Rejuvenation is on show from 23 June until autumn 2024 at The Denver Art Museum.
Find out more:
www.denverartmuseum.org