This monograph on Susanna Bauer presents the artist’s work to an international audience for the first time in book form. The essential ingredients of Bauer’s artistic production are the ephemeral natural elements that she encounters during walks and hikes in the South-West of the UK, where she lives and works. They are leaves, stones, twigs… elements that become the heart of more elaborate creations rendered with crochet – sometimes used conventionally as a decoration, other times as a sculptural means of communication. Bauer’s leaves are airy sculptures in which the artist pursues a balance between strength and fragility. Nature becomes a metaphor for humanity: the artfully interwoven threads remind us that we are all part of a vaster network and therefore generators of connections. But it also stands for life: viewing these works it is impossible not to reflect on the confluences of beauty and vulnerability, resistance and transformation.
The theme of the relationship between art and nature, and the ensuing interconnections, are investigated both through Bauer’s original work and in an introductory essay that analyses her oeuvre within the broader context of the history of art.
