Carla Edwards uses sculpture, performance, drawing, and video to examine how dominant culture and its artifacts shape our sense of identity and self. Through appropriation, manipulation, and reconfiguration of pop imagery and Americana vernacular, the artist’s material interventions alter or deconstruct the meaning of an original subject. These gestures—often ritualistic in nature—seek to understand our complex relationship to symbols and the often-humorous solace they inspire. Materiality and the notion of the hand or labor are important to the work. Cultural identity and the political reside in what is made. A gesture of solace, a covetous object, a thing made with spiritual devotion or a fervent patriotism are the things she finds most seductive and inspiring.
Carla Edwards is a Brooklyn-based artist. She received an MFA from Rhode Island School of Design and a BFA from The School of The Art Institute of Chicago. She is an alumna of Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture and was a studio fellow in the Whitney Independent Study Program. Edwards has exhibited nationally and internationally, most notably at the Studio Museum in Harlem, NYC; Nuit Blanche Toronto, Canada; Volta5, Basel, Switzerland; and Socrates Sculpture Park, Queens, NY.
My current project examines how dominant culture, and artifacts shape our sense of identity and self. Through appropriation, I make material interventions that alter or deconstruct an original subject to be manipulated and reconfigured in a way that has changed it’s meaning. This gesture, often ritualistic in nature seeks to understand our complex relationship to symbols, and the often-humorous solace they inspire. I view this process of altering as a means of gaining current and tactile access to the symbols that surround me. Materiality and the notion of the hand or labor, is important in my work. Cultural identity and the political reside in what is made. A gesture of solace, a covetous object, a thing made with spiritual devotion or a fervent patriotism are the things I find most seductive and inspiring.
