Akua Lezli Hope

Artist Statement

My sculptures embody my interest in poetry, jazz, and mythological imagery.

I use a number of techniques to create sculpture including direct furnace casting, kiln forming and casting, and flameworking in glass.

In paper I use vacuum forming, pulp casting and handmade molds to shape cotton, abaca, flax, homegrown plant, and recycled paper fibers.

My sculptural glass embodies my interest in mythological imagery, symbolism, and traditions from African and Caribbean cultures.

I study these symbols and philosophies to develop ideas and create a new mythos, using glass as a sculptural medium.

The elements of African visual language express the union of human beings and nature. They are part of my thought and art. The creation of this art becomes my ritual, is my work and prayer.
For me, the process is metaphor, the manipulation of the material itself, the process, is charged, has meaning, is expressive.

The act of repurposing paper and creating forms with it, is one such process.

Kiln formed glass often involving assembling bits, holds its referents for me in quilting, and in sewing, as I stitch the parts together with the thread of heat.

Kiln casting with its many steps from model making to mold forming to mold filling, reminds me most of the act of writing -- the many iterations to fulfill the idea, the journey to find the form for the idea, and how each step fulfills or changes it.

Furnace cast glass enables me to articulate my aesthetic concerns, to combine the gesture with the transcendent, to tell a story, and hint at the story beyond, to cast my net and catch fast swimming meaning.

My current work, Shield, explores symbols of protection and healing, and ancient African imagery.

I work through the study of these African and African American symbols and images to create a new mythos that expresses a connection between the past and the present, makes good manifest, and figures the transcendent.

Thank you for looking, for bearing witness.