Laura Ellen Bacon
(British, Contemporary)

Stripped Somerset Willow. Reclaimed Teak and Brass Fittings, Unique

Height 145cm

Brought to The Walk by

Hignell Gallery

https://hignellgallery.com/contact/

‘I like to remind us that nature can still surprise us, to install a curiosity that the work may have been made by human hands or it may have been made by plant or animal.’

Laura Ellen Bacon

Working predominantly in willow, Laura Ellen Bacon crafts natural materials by hand and is renowned for her large-scale woven or formed spaces which embrace, surround or engulf architectural and natural structures. Her work encourages the viewer to experience nature and their environment in a different way. Though best known for her vast site-specific installations, Bacon says ‘I actually enjoy the more meticulous density in small pieces’

Created during lockdown and during the cold winter months, ‘Awake’ communicates a feeling of compression and of being tethered, hence the vice-like supporting structure. The frozen winter days, however, brought forward a sense of awe for the life awakening outside the window. The form of ‘Awake’ takes its energy from the hopeful image of seedlings and bulbs beginning to push through the frozen soil and knowing that winter’s grip would soon be broken. The artwork was created entirely upon the supporting structure, linking, curling and responding to the compression. The sculpture feels powered by its internal motion. It has an uncanny muscularity like an organism that is palpable.

The willow used was grown and harvested in Somerset and has been stripped of its bark and the warm white is the natural colour of the willow stem. Willow weaving is a highly sustainable practice, using a renewable resource, willow, that absorbs carbon dioxide, and can be harvested annually without harming the plant.

The ancient technique of willow weaving is found across the world and can be traced back 10,000 years. Today Bacon reimagines this timeless medium and employs her own non-traditional style of working that she has developed over 20 years to create contemporary, abstract sculptures. Her works celebrate the joy of manipulating raw materials by hand, without the need for complex machinery or large teams of people.

Bacon says  ‘I’m not at all an expert in conventional willow skills, and I never will be because I use such a personal technique. I’ve never made a basket, for example. I continue to be fascinated with how the willow is grown and produced and am pleased to be working with a sustainable material.’

Writer and curator Glenn Adamson noted to Bacon ‘your sculpture is different from any other sculpture, I think what's different is that this relationship to precedence and specific crafts that are found within communities and places in their traditions and that you're paying a lot of respect. There's a certain sense of deference there which I actually think is extremely appropriate and I would regard that as an asset, being aware maybe that they were the first people to try to do great things .’

Laura Ellen Bacon’s installations respond and to their historic sites. Her sculptures engage the viewer to reconsider the space as with her latest exhibit in the eighteenth century chapel at Yorkshire  Sculpture Park (April-September 2025).