Biography
Ideologues and Dictators: Lenin, Hitler, Ho Chi Minh, Khomeini, Mao, Marx, Mill, Stalin, Arafat, 12/2004, each approximately 6in x 3in x 1in, latex, false hair
“I’ve always been an artist, even as a little kid (with the typical desires to be an astronaut or marine biologist) when I made a lot of things out of clay. As an adult I make stuff out of wood, probably because of my work history in cabinet making. It’s relatively recently that I realized that I like the process of making stuff precisely as possible, as mathematically as possible.”
–Sarah Bednarek, 2018
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Sarah Bednarek was visionary sculptor who passed away from cancer on December 24, 2019. She was 39. She was first diagnosed in 2009, and near death following emergency surgery, she felt herself hurtling toward a light in a tunnel of kaleidoscopic ever-changing geometric forms. After she recovered, her work changed momentously. She was inspired to bring these visions in to the world of the corporeal, inspired by the profundity of shape and color alone. Though a Milwaukee native she made Bushwick, Brooklyn her home.
Working sculpturally with wood, power tools, and an indefatigable spirit, her work would explore formal relationships such as symmetry, repetition, texture and color through rigorous geometry and craftsmanship. She was a 2005 MFA graduate of the Sculpture program at Virginia Commonwealth University and a 2002 BFA graduate of University of Minnesota. In 2007, she was a awarded an Artist Residency at Sculpture Space.
Her exhibition record included solo shows at TSA, Brooklyn (‘18), Thomas Hunter Project Space, New York (‘15). Her work has been represented in curated exhibition both nationally and internationally including Present Company (‘18), Trestle Gallery (‘17). She received several awards and scholarships in support of her art.