Sculpture Space

Melissa Vertosick

Artwork created during residency.


(Click on image to enlarge.)

Delmont, PA
Residency: January – February 2006

Artist Statement

"As artifacts, my sculptures form installations focusing on my experiences and relationships. Memory, interactions, and societal influences shape my perspectives of objects and situations as well as my relationships. I use the domestic as form because it is constant yet in flux. Changing the scale, isolating, or switching materials alters the objects, activities, and experiences. This focuses attention on the experience of each sculpture while acknowledging the complexity of my influences. The visceral, physical, and visual interact to expose tensions, such as attraction and repulsion as well as aloneness and community. Through the blurring of private and public, my work creates a stage for the viewer to enter and become part of the sculpture. It is through participation that the tensions, emotions, and imprint of my thoughts are shared." — Melissa Vertosick

About the Artist
Melissa Vertosick lives in Delmont, PA. She received her MFA in Sculpture from Pennsylvania State University and earned her BFA in Sculpture at West Virginia University. Vertosick’s work has been shown in Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Maryland.

Project Description
I revisited fiberglass and resin for the site sensitive work I am installing at the end of March. This work is a relief sculpture. The oval resin frame has repeating ovoid and circular forms. From the cracked top ovoid form, the rubber portrait pours out onto screening and flows over the edge of the bottom of the frame. This work acts as a transition between the Renaissance and the contemporary galleries in its intended space. I used references to the cameo, portraiture, and the domestic to create a work that ties to my previous work and interests as well as fit the space.

My second work at Sculpture Space differs in scale and material. This is a thirty foot long steel and fabric tunnel that ends in an eight-foot diameter room, also constructed with steel and fabric. It is a participatory work, asking the viewers to enter the space, as the outside is very nondescript. As the tunnel progresses closer to the room, the outside environment becomes less visible until it is completely removed. The space is seven feet high and four feet wide, keeping the space intimate and solitary. In the room will be an environment with a fun house-like mirror that will enhance the close feeling and the loss of sight/perception. The viewer returns by the same path in and experiences the opposite effect as the outer environment becomes clear again.