- About
I’m an artist living in Northfield, MN, and working at the intersection of craft, narrative, and design. I love sculpting in various materials, making furniture, drawing, writing, and filmmaking. Most of my projects eventually incorporate wood as a material. I like the way it can be either humble and insubstantial (consider the toothpick or IKEA furniture) or monumental, opulent, or otherwise infused with meaning (say, a temple), and my work often playfully engages both ends of this spectrum. My mom once told me, “Everything you touch turns to wood,” which felt like it could have been a curse and which might be on my tombstone someday (a wooden tombstone, naturally).
My sculpture and furniture pieces engage with and question the idea of what it means for an object to be functional. The ideal I strive for is an artwork poised at the brink of an action that is still partially undefined. As in the case of architecture or theatrical props (two ways of making that run in parallel to my practice) I seek to make objects that suggest an imaginative or unpredictable activation. Often this lies in a balance between carefully rendered craft and moments of intentional space, incompleteness, or constraint.
I am deeply drawn to the idea of “wonder,” and I try to make my work a space for both the viewer and me to experience a form of wonder, each of us in our own way.
This is a film I made about a my strange relationship with Christmas trees, and which may indirectly explain some of my preoccupations as a furniture maker and woodworker:
https://filmfreeway.com/projects/2119931
I post photos of my smaller projects and in-progress work on Instagram: @marcelthechamp
- Region
- Northfield, MN
- Website
- andersmakes.com
- Media
- Woodworking
- Professional Status
- Studio art technician - st. olaf college, northfield, mn