KELLY O’DELL
Kelly O’Dell sees nature in the long view—its far-reaching past, its captivating present, and its precarious future.
“Animal extinction is occurring mostly by way of human-caused habitat destruction and climate change. It is fascinating and devastating to me that our presence as one species has so much impact on the delicate balance of life. Using sculpture, I am recreating the endangered, the critically endangered, and the extinct in glass.”
O’Dell revives the Ammonite in glorious dimensions. Glass is blown in varying thicknesses, carved to move light effortlessly through the helix-like form. With her sumptuous palette—at times opaque and creamy, at times delicately transparent, at times dusted with luster—the work blends realism with an aura of fantasy. O’Dell brings this amalgam of scientific accuracy and artistic license to endangered sea creatures of today such as coral, concerned that human impact on the natural world will mimic history’s astronomical disasters. The viewer’s eye dances around the craggy textures, milky colors, and clustered forms of her coral, compelling us to protect this threatened species. Themes of extinction and preservation invariably reflect back on the self and our own mortality; O’Dell’s glass pieces memorialize nature’s lost glories, endeavor to forestall future destruction, and contemplate the universal life cycle of life, death, and renewal.
