Dividing Gravity | Alissa Lamarre

Michigan born and based, Alissa Lamarre is a detail-oriented maker who has shown her work nationally and internationally, with recent exhibitions in Detroit, Boston, New York, and the Netherlands. She received her BFA from Western Michigan University and her MFA from Cranbrook Academy of Art in 2013.

Alissa has been a practicing metalsmith for nine years, primarily focusing on jewelry and small objects. The foundation for Alissa’s artistic interests reside in drawing, illustration, and the exploration of material language, using her native Midwest’s physical and cultural landscape to explore the various manifestations of heritage and navigation.  She currently resides in Detroit, MI dividing her time between her private practice, managing Simone DeSousa Gallery, and teaching at Fritzwillis Jewelry Studio in Franklin, MI.

“My interest is based in the roles of the imagination as we grow older. Daydreaming and other methods of escapism evolve with our lives, as we become increasingly inundated with formalities and expectations.  We develop new mechanisms to simplify and alleviate, in an increasingly fervent attempt to carve away spaces in time to simply be. 

This body of work is made from a position of standing still; a luxury that allows us to be anchored to the ground and yet completely vulnerable to elements, time, and the inherent duality in escapism. It is a position that resists growth, yet all the stories and scenarios harbored in the mind find fertile ground to take hold and spread like wildfires. 

This series of objects vary in form, from adornment to sculptural landscape, running alongside each other as parallel vantage points.  Some predict the future, others dwell in the past, allowing the subtle transference of our stories. Form and surface may transcend for a short while, if not to simply serve as validity for our daydreams.

There is earnest failure in gravity, and an undeniable comfort in falling back to earth.”

– Alissa Lamarre