Gerrard shapes steel wire into ethereal forms that remain both opaque and permeable, punctuated by stones and antique fishing floats. In building up her compositions, Gerrard emphasizes form through line rather than mass. Her intricate and expressive three-dimensional installations animate the surrounding space as they suspend, drape, loop and bloom. The flowing lines and swells evoke a lyrical quality, reflecting the artist’s slow, meditative process. Gerrard's work is deeply influenced by her time in Seattle, WA, where she moves between the city's historic welding shops and the forests of the Pacific Northwest. Gerrard explains, “I have been able to continually move between industry and nature, and my work reflects that flow, growth, and tension.”  

 

Leah Gerrard is a Seattle-based fabrication artist who explores solid form using thin, flexible strands of metal. She studied at Linfield University, Cornish College of the Arts, and Studio Art Centers International in Florence, Italy. A jewelry class in Florence sparked Gerrard's passion for wire sculpture. Gerrard’s self-taught sculpting method merges her interests in basketry and jewelry with her desire to create large-scale work. Her sculpture has grown in response to challenges inherent in her designs. Gerrard cites Ruth Asawa, Sheila Hicks and Alberto Giacometti as sources of her inspiration. She received the 2016 Artist Trust Fellowship in Craft from the State of Washington and in 2019 she was awarded a solo exhibition at Gallery 4culture, the nonprofit cultural funding agency for Seattle, WA and the surrounding county. As the Metal Museum’s 46th Tributaries artist, Gerrard will be exhibiting her work for the first time in our region. 

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Image credit: Leah Gerrard, The Answer in the Number, 2021. Steel wire, rocks, wood. Artwork and photograph courtesy of the Artist.