About

The artist, Nicole Scannell, was born and raised in Chicago, Illinois.  She received her BFA in Printmaking at Northern Illinois University in Dekalb, Illinois.  The artist has her MFA in Sculpture at Texas A&M University located in Corpus Christi. 

Traveling has exposed me to the various ecosystems scattered across our planet. When I was younger, family road trips allowed me to explore the contiguous United States. The places we visited were vastly different than my hometown of Chicago, Illinois. The textures, natural fractal-like patterns, symbiotic relationships of plant forms, and animals observed on these travels were of particular interest to me. They provided me with inspiration for the forms, surface textures and colors of my sculptures.

No trip was more inspirational than Australia. Shortly after my high school graduation, my family and I took a two-week trip down under, where my mom and I learned to scuba dive and explored the Great Barrier Reef. We also learned of the precarious state of today’s reefs and the danger they are in due to warming ocean temperatures and pollution. My work mimics the texture and forms of corals.

This jarring and resulting confusion is something I’m familiar with. I was diagnosed with dyslexia at a young age. The condition can take many forms and has several levels of severity. In my case, it affects my ability to read and comprehend the written word. I jumble letters and numbers, and I find it challenging to read, write and understand what most would consider simple sentences and ideas. It’s difficult to force yourself to read something that looks encoded when you know you’re going to have trouble understanding what it means anyway. This has often been discouraging, but my escape is day dreaming. While I draw inspiration from earthly wonders, the natural, the manmade, other artists, my teachers and my peers, I can’t help but infuse my work with my dreams and imagination. Perhaps it’s a symptom of my condition – intuitively working with my hands – but it comes so naturally to me to create these tangible objects. Maybe it’s a way to cope with dyslexia. Maybe it’s a way to ensure my feelings are expressed. There are no complex paragraphs to decode in a sculpture. I can take all my emotions, and without words – without having to explain myself – I can show what I feel. And isn’t that the point of art?

As I understand more about why I create, my understanding of what I don’t know grows. Constant artistic self-evolution pushes my work into new areas. And with every new area, there’s another world to explore. There are more emotions to unpack.