Bonny Leibowitz
Statements for each body of work can be found with accompanying portfolios under "Work" or as a PDF here.

Presentation PDF

Artist Statement

My work considers nature in relation to the built environment, the studio to land art, and photography as a substitute for reality.

The site-specific objects and installations embody concepts of Post-naturalism, challenging the objectification of nature as pristine and separate from humans. I investigate narratives that have enabled the alteration and degradation of the natural world. In these installations, I manipulate and conjoin mangled steel, plastics, and architectural parts culled from the streets and salvage yards, alongside tree roots and branches gathered after storms. I photograph the work both in the studio and outdoors. The resulting images, along with my photographs of trees and landscapes, are printed on large sheets of aluminum, film, and textiles, which I reconstruct and integrate into installations.

The inclusion of salvaged parts came about after I happened upon an active demolition site. Suggestive of a war zone crossed with an amusement park, the scene was both horrific and beautiful. The poetic elegance of the mangled steel and the destruction of the façade was unexpected and mesmerizing. This moment sharpened my awareness of the land’s ravages and the inextricable entanglement of nature and industrialization. I photographed the site and collected debris - processes and materials that have since become integral to my work.

The installations function as facsimiles of nature, where the distinction between reality and representation erodes over time, and the veil between other and self, out-there and in-here, continually thins.