Stephanie Simek
Using an array of materials, Stephanie Simek makes works in two dimensions, three dimensions, sound, and performance. She has lived in the Pacific Northwest since 2007. At that time, she began performing with instruments she built from deconstructed obsolete devices. Continuing on the path of researching the inner workings of materials and systems with unique and exceptional properties, she was an artist in residence at Portland’s Museum of Contemporary Craft, dedicated to a study titled Jewels/Joules. This led to a research residency at Signal Culture in New York, where she studied the magnetic recording potential of minerals. Looking further into visualizing what is happening under the surface, Simek then worked as a physicist’s apprentice making ultrasonic sensors, a two-year partnership which allowed her to incorporate specialized skills into her practice and further develop her perspective on material relationships. She received her MFA in Photo/Media at the University of Washington in 2020. While developing a new body of work this past year, she has been an artist in residence in Japan, the Netherlands, and at Mass MoCA where she received the Ford Family Foundation’s Oregon Visual Arts Fellowship. She was also a 2024 recipient of the Oregon Arts Commission’s Individual Artist Fellowship.
tied to the moon, tide to the moon, at Veronica, October 8 – November 26, 2022
Fractal Vise with Keystone, 2024
plastic, hydrophobic silica, hydrated silica, hardware
3 3/8 x 16 1/2 x 6 1/4 inches
$4800
Tardigrade (impossibly resistant, resilient microorganism) shaped fractal vise. A fractal vise is designed to grip/contain difficult, irregular objects. In this case, holding loose, malleable sand. Sand is keystone-shaped (a keystone is the final stone set in place when building an arch- it doesn’t bear any weight- its purpose is to exert outward force which holds the arch in place). So holding by pushing outward (keystone) and holding by pushing inward (vise). Hydrophobic silica (kinetic sand) holds hydrated silica (an opal). This type of opal is sometimes called a galaxy opal because the way it refracts looks like there’s a little universe inside of it, but with this particular specimen there’s a naturally occurring hole inside it.
Step-ups, 2019
salvaged walnut from the Pacific Northwest
dimensions variable
$12,000 (set of 5 chairs)
unique
Interlocking chairs contain structural elements from the Amish step-up stool (circular cutout, straight back, shortened seat height), which could be hung from the handle by a hook on the wall. The contours of the chairs are derived from the outlines of five Cistertian monks in a field, depicted in The Life of Saint Bernard of Clairvaux , a painting by Jörg Breu the Elder. Cistertian monks were credited with preserving a great deal of written information from the Dark Ages and developing hydraulic textile mills, which would eventually lead to an early form of modern computing- the jacquard loom.
Keys (for Future Locks), 2019
24k gold-plated copper
dimensions variable
$600 each
unique
The key before the lock. Keys made with “self-determined” grooves grown through the process of electrochemical deposition- copper crystals are formed onto copper sheet in an electrolyte bath (ions pulled from one piece of scrap/sacrificial copper and deposited onto the other piece of “good” metal, slowly forming crystals). Then plated in 24k gold. Key “head” profiles are derived from the shapes of the artist’s collection of tumbled ocean stones.
Klein Bottle Pierrot, 2023
organza
34 x 32 x 10 inches
$2000
unique
Klein bottles (three-dimensional mathematical anomalies that have no inside or outside) and Pierrot, the 17th century “sad clown” character whose signature appearance (this costume as a container itself- wholly recognizable without any particular actor) is still understood today as embodying psychological emptiness through loneliness and heartache.