Germination

  • January 26- March 4, 2004
  • Opening reception Thursday February 26th, 6:30 pm
  • Artist talk in the gallery at 7:00 pm

Shelley Gardner is fascinated by the unique and often strange ways that flora and fauna manage to ensure their reproduction in a hostile environment. She is “intrigued by the whole notion of beauty and the repulsive edge to it. I like to create work that is beautiful but unexplainably disturbing.” Gardner employs nature as an enduring source of inspiration, often garnering ideas from her long walks in nature. Her amoeboid sculptures are emulative of seedpods, crystal formations, river bottom sediments, and other natural phenomena. Her quizzical and unsettling, multi-layered surfaces are an attempt to mirror the slow cumulative processes of nature.

Scouring the large farmers markets and Italian deli’s of her hometown of Oakland, her recent interests have turned to investigating the myriad textures and colors of natural materials found in these spaces. Gardner received her MFA from the California College of Arts and Crafts, and her BA in Studio Art from Humboldt State University. She has exhibited in numerous galleries and museums throughout California, including the Crocker Art Museum, Sacramento, the Sonoma Museum of Visual Art, the San Francisco Arts Commission, the Jean Roebuck Gallery in Lafayette, Works/San Jose, and in venues in Idaho, Washington and Oregon.

Updated: May 30, 2023