Archives

The Loophole of Retreat, 1991 Commissioned by the Whitney Museum at Phillip Morris

Migration, 1992 Contemporary Art Center, Cincinnati,OH.

Passionate Attitudes, 1995 Threadwaxing Space, New York

As Above, So Below, 1998 A suite of glass and mosaic works for Grand Central Terminal, New York Link here to interactive map 

Ahab’s Wife, 1998 Commissioned for the Henson International Puppet Festival

Circuitstream, 2000 Commissioned by the Bank of America, Charlotte, North Carolina This sandblasted glass wall is sited in the digital headquarters of the Bank of America. Silhouetted portraits from American coins are connected by a network to an early computer circuitboard from the 1950’s. Commissioned by the Bank of America, Charlotte, North Carolina.

Meanderlink, 2000 An airplane banner celebrating Frederick Law Olmsted’s legacy in Boston

Drawings 2001-3

Turnscope, 2001 Collaboration with Nick Tobier for the Green Street Gallery, Boston, MA.

Ghost, 2003 Cloth, wood, 18’L x 36’H x 4’W, Smack Mellon, New York

Drawings 2003-5

Catching the Drift, 2003 A Women’s Restroom for the Smith College Museum of Art

Betwixt, 2004 Installation at the Motoazabu Gallery in Tokyo, Japan, curated by Zero Higashida, 14’L x 7’W x 8’H, newspaper, cloth.

Paper Architecture, 2002

Aqueous Humour, 2004 South Boston Maritime Park, Commissioned by the MassPort, Boston, MA.

Parallax, 2004 Video collaboration with Jane D. Marsching A collaboration between Ellen Driscoll and Jane D. Marsching. Clementine, an intrepid marionette, explores landscapes both historical and contemporary against a poetic backdrop of sound and text that describe an interior landscape of love lost. Her voyages take her down a mine shaft, into a domestic interior, and up and out to the surface of the moon and beyond to a vista of nebulae where she encounters dense black holes or voids, to which she is irresistibly drawn.

Veil, 2005 For the Tashkent Biennale, a series of works made with newspaper, cloth, beads. The series of works entitled “Veil” were created with pages of the The New York Times layered with translucent silk organza, permeated by stains that resemble Rorschach ink blots or maps. Beads sewn into the surface create a third layer of plan views of historic labyrinths. These works traveled to the Tashkent Biennale, Uzbekistan, curated by Andre Nakov.

Pro Patria Mori, 2006 Security Gates for the Liberty Memorial and Museum, Kansas City, Missouri Selected by Public Art Network Year in Review as one of the best public art projects of 2006

Lumina, 2006 A Public Electronic Animation sign, MassArt, Boston, Mass.

Hunter-Gatherer, 2007 #2 harvested plastic, 21’L x 18’W x 24″H This installation is a 21′ landscape made from plastic milk and water cartons scavenged from the streets of Brooklyn and the Town Recycling Center of Peterborough, NH. The salvaged material is reconfigured into a micro-world of satellite towers, abandoned oil rigs, highways and other structures.

Revenant, 2007 #2 harvested plastic, 18’L x 7’H x 3’W Revenant was created for a two person exhibition with Zero Higashida, for the Bank of Japan in Hiroshima, one of the few buildings to survive the atomic blast. The 18 foot bridge has a dredging crane on one end, which is attached by looping chains to a McMansion on the other end.  A slum colony with a satellite dish clings to the underside of the McMansion. The bridge structure is based on the Forth Bridge, an innovation in engineering at the dawn of the 20th century.

Phantom Limb, 2007 #2 harvested plastic, 14’L x 7’H x 8’W

Drawings, 2007-8

Wingspun, 2008 Terminal C, Raleigh Durham Airport

On the Waterfront, 2009 An Interview with Ellen Driscoll by Cheryl Kaplan, published by Spokes Press

BOMBLive! BOMB Magazine Interview, 2007

Fastforwardfossil Drawings, 2007-8 exhibited with Fastforwardfossil; Part 1 at Frederieke Taylor Gallery, 2009

Filament/Firmament, 2010 Commissioned by the Cambridge Arts Council for the Cambridge Public Library Selected by Fred Wilson for the Public Art Network’s Year in Review, Best Public Projects of 2010

Fastforwardfossil; Part 2, Drawings, 2009 exhibited at Smack Mellon, 2009 These drawings are based on a close study of the inner workings of Ireland’s only oil refinery in Whitegate, which I had access to in August 2009 through the Sirius Art Centre residency. By using shifts of scale between the macro and the micro, they depict a dystopic future based on rampant oil consumption. The worlds in the drawings are drained of color, but filled with the flux and spillage of a potentially chaotic future.

Near Everywhere, 2009 Curated by Ellen Driscoll for GASP, Brookline, Mass Catalogue published in conjunction with the exhibition Near Everywhere, curated by Ellen Driscoll and shown at GASP, Brookline, MA, March 27th – May 2nd, 2009. Near Everywhere featured the work of Troy David Ouellete, Deb Todd Wheeler, Marguerite Kahrl, Jane D. Marsching, Ellen Driscoll, Adriane Colburn and Vivan Sundaram. The catalogue is available for purchase through http://www.lulu.com/content/paperback-book/near-everywhere/6683980

 Fastforwardfossil; Part 1, 2009 #2 harvested plastic, 18′ L x 4’H x 8’W

Fastforwardfossil; Part 2, 2009 #2 harvested plastic, 30’L x 7’H x 14’W

Still Life Recycled plastic, 3’H x 20’L x 13’W

Published in 2010 by Point La Vue Press, with a comprehensive catalogue essay by Patricia Phillips and book design by Karen Davidson, this is an important document of the sculpture and drawing work from 2009 exhbited at Smack Mellon and at the Frederieke Taylor Gallery. Available for $15 from www.lulu.com

“Bird’s Eye” AGNI magazine

With a catalogue essay by Patricia Phillips and designed by Karen Davidson, this artist’s book is a comprehensive document of the FastForwardFossil sculptures and drawings from the 2 solo exhibitions of 2009 at Smack Mellon and Frederieke Taylor Gallery. Available at www.lulu.com

In this two person exhibition with Ellen Driscoll and Robert Oxnam, we spent several days creating a matrix that would make a single work out of our two disparate bodies of work on a 25 foot wall at the Brooklyn Zen Center.

Distant Mirrors is a floating archipelago of forms floating in the Providence River, made with plastic bottles donated by the Rhode Island Resource Recovery Corporation. This project was created with Rose Heydt, Dianne Hebbert, Megan McLaughlin, and Ponnapa Prakkamakul. Funded by the Robert and Margaret McColl Johnson fellowship of the Rhode Island Foundaton, and created with thanks to the Roger Williams National Memorial, Artists in Context, and Clay Rockefeller. www.distantmirrors.net

The Vertical Gallery at the Esther Massry Gallery at the College of St. Rose features a site-specific sculpture entitled “Wraith” created for this beautiful 27′ high atrium. “Wraith” is a translucent mountain hovering just above visitor’s heads. Clinging to it’s underside, like barnacles on a rock, is an upside-down, contemporary American landscape, in miniature, with an oil refinery, abandoned houses, mountains and bare trees.

For the past five years Ellen Driscoll, head of the sculpture department at Rhode Island School of Design, has used discarded plastic water and milk bottles as her sculpture medium, creating public works of beauty and meaning. “Distant Mirrors” floated on the Providence River in Providence, R.I., portraying maps of land masses and historical settlements. Her work is included in numerous major collections, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Whitney Museum of Art. Be sure to check out our Sculptcast website for photos and links. Enjoy. CHERYL BOWLAN Producer

Published in 2012 by Lawrence King, and edited by Maxmilian Goldfarb and Matt Bua

“Finding Resonant Details in a Big Picture” a conversation with Jan Riley

This series of drawings were generated while in Rome from January 2013 – June 2013, while serving as the Chief Critic for the European Honors program of RISD.

Artist Aurora Robson has created Project Vortex, an international collective of artists who use plastic debris in their work. The site raises funds for non-profit organizations engaged in cleaning waterways around the world.

 

This piece was created for the Bard College Studio Arts Faculty exhibition in the fall of 2013.

A catalogue on the 2011 public project “Distant MIrrors” with an essay by Jenn Joy is available at www.lulu.com Essays by Ellen Driscoll and John McNiff, Park Ranger at the Roger Williams National Memorial Park in Providence, RI is available as a pdf.

An interview with Brian Hersh in Sarasota, Florida on the new mosaic commission at Sarasota National Cemetery, March 27. Go to minute 17 for the start of my part of the interview!

This talk was given in conjunction with “Core Sample” a solo exhibition at the College of St. Rose Esther Massry Gallery.

The Olana Partnership and Wave Farm’s WGXC 90.7 FM are pleased to present Groundswell, a new iteration of their award winning event. From 2-6, visitors will explore contemporary works sited throughout the grounds of Frederic Church’s historic Hudson Valley estate, Olana. “Telescopic Tea Table” created with Daniela Gomez, is a mirrored table upon whose surface float countries where Church painted during his international travels, and mirrored tea pots which directly mirror sculpted ornamentation on the historic house on the hill above.

“Night to Day, Here and Away” fabricated by Mosaika, and Red Linen Design for Sarasota National Cemetery, funded by the Patterson Foundation for the Veteran’s Administration.  The 50’ x 3′ mosaic on the front of the stage depicts a fictional landscape of Earth, Air, and Water in which all five branches of the military service carry out their work. The landscape goes from night to day to night over the span of the 50’ length. Vast differences of time and geography are a part of many military family’s lives.

There’s a huge shipping crane at the end of my new street. I hold up my thumb and align it with the edge of the shipping container on the crane. For this brief moment, they share a line in space, my body aligned to points both near and far. If indeed the tiniest speck of dust can be considered the trace material of the Big Bang, then my work inserts a human index to make points and lines of connection on that continuum from the infinitesimal to the gigantic.

This series of drawings is based on observation of the weeds and “volunteer” plants coming up through the cracks of Red Hook, Brooklyn, the urban birds–pigeons, sparrows, and starlings, and other aspects of the local visual environment—pennants at a ball field, empty signs, a satellite dish. There are also maps of present and historical Red Hook, and Shenzhen and Guangzhu, two of the largest cities in China, our biggest trading partner–because Red Hook is also a port.

The wind currents over the Atlantic Ocean are burned into my grandmother’s blanket,a blanket which has endured decades of small repairs as it got passed down through several generations. The edges of the blanket are cut away in a drawing of continental boundaries.

This new series of drawings continue the exploration begun in the “Soundings” exhibition with Margaret Cogswell at Kentler International Drawing Space. Based on “volunteer” plants in sites like the Siena train station and the medieval walls, as well as those in the Botanical Garden, the drawings explore visual oscillation between indoor and outdoor space, ideas of cross-pollination between indigenous and non-indigenous species.

This photograph by Jacqueline Tune is of me looking up at a “corbezzelo” plant growing on the top of one of Siena’s medieval walls. It ended up in one of my drawings upside down.

A new book of commissioned works at Oliver Ranch in California by Joan Simon with essays by Neil Benezra and Steve Oliver has just been published by Gregory R. Miller and Co.

This short video shows the process of drawings created at the Siena Art Institute Fall Project residency.

“Soundings,” an exhibition of new works on paper by Margaret Cogswell and Ellen Driscoll, is an evocative, two-pronged study of Red Hook, a community facing New York Bay (and the Statue of Liberty). Since it is both urban and maritime, they decided to divide it between them, Cogswell focusing on water and Driscoll on land.

This is a catalogue of drawings and sculptures with essays by Mark Alice Durant and Tom Sleigh, elegantly designed by Elisa Maezono. ISBN 978-0-692-73572-5 copies available for $25 if you send an email request to ellendriscoll@gmail.com I can send you an invoice via paypal to be paid as a guest via credit or debit card

A mosaic commission by Public Art for Public Schools for the Middle College High School and the International High School in Long Island City is being installed in August. Mosaic fabrication by Mosaika. A series of 6 classroom workshops on mapping and geography were held in spring of 2016.

Venti Trasversali These drawings began with an investigation into the historical process of making charcoal in Tuscany. Four indigenous trees—oak, chestnut, pine, and arbutus—are used in this ancient process. Because of its unique molecular composition, charcoal is now used globally to extract toxins—from earth, from people—as a healing corrective. In the drawings, this molecular remedy is represented by honeycomb sieves. In one drawing, the maps of countries are caught by the sieve.

“Bower” is commissioned for Art Park by City as Living Laboratory, a non profit created by Mary Miss.

Slipstream In Ellen Driscoll’s recent work, plants are drawn into allegorical tableaux that speak to environmental change and adaptation. Some of the plants in her herbarium are used for remediation of toxins in soil, such as the sunflower which is use …

Continue reading “Botany and Landscape”

Thicket May 5— June 23 Opening Reception Friday, May 5th 6—9pm Wed-Fri 1-5pm Sat-Sun 11am- 4 pm or by appointment 508-843-2184 Rafius Fane Gallery The Rafius Fane Gallery is pleased to present “Thicket”, a solo exhibition of recent sculptures and drawings by Ellen Driscoll. In her sculptures, Driscoll combines cloth that typically covers the body as clothing or blanket with larger abstractions of maps and diagrams, or the wilds of tangled forest branches . The scale of the singular and intimate body is set against the much larger scale of cities,

New drawing and painting by Ellen Driscoll and Ken Buhler in a two person exhibition at Lesley Heller Workspace, 54 Orchard St., New York, NY, January 10-February 18

Wake examines the power of water to sustain life and to destroy it and also looks at what is left in its wake. The paintings, drawings, sculptures, and installations in this exhibition explore the sheer force of water in the form of waves, storms, and energy, as well as the aftermath of water once it retreats: parched earth, invasive plants, dwindling animal populations, human illness. The visual dialogue between these six artists invites reflection and discussion on the impact of global climate change

Ellen Driscoll, the recipient of the ISC’s 2018 Outstanding Educator Award, applies a unique approach to storytelling and an inventive use of materials to her public artworks and smaller studio sculptures. In her practice, drawing and sculpture are int …

Continue reading “Fluid Perspectives,Sculpture Magazine”

In Ellen Driscoll’s recent work, plants are drawn into allegorical tableaux that speak to environmental change and adaptation. Some of the plants in her herbarium are used for remediation of toxins in soil, such as the sunflower which is used to revive …

Continue reading “Botanical Drawings”

This is an exciting new initiative that I am part of, with a dynamic group of artists. https://www.vivavirtualartists.org/

How This Brooklyn Artist is Reshaping Her Art After Almost Losing it All 2022 Renowned Brooklyn artist Ellen Driscoll’s work was never inspired by her personal life — until she got a diagnosis that changed everything.

Commissioned by the General Services Administration Art in Architecture Program Fabricated by Mosaika Hand-glazed ceramic and Byzantine glass smalti Location: Charles R. Jonas Federal Courthouse, Charlotte, NC Ellen Driscoll created Site Woven, a serie …

Continue reading “Site Woven”

Sept 9-November 5, 2022 Writers and Books Rochester,  New York www.wab.org Sept. 9: Opening event 5-7 Oct.7: Conversation–Ellen Driscoll 6:30-7:15 Nov. 4: Poetry Reading—Kathy Engel 6:30-7:15 Press Release Eyechart  

October 7 @ EST 6:30 pm – 7:15 pm Artist in Residence | Gallery Talk with Ellen Driscoll Writers and Books Rochester,  New York www.wab.org Behind the Curtain: View Eyechart, then join us for artist Ellen Driscoll’s talk on her creative process. Admiss …

Continue reading “Writers & Books Ellen Driscoll Artist Talk”

“Field Notes” Ken Buhler and Ellen Driscoll January 18-February 11, 2023 University Art Gallery Central Michigan University