Kristen Sanders -- Ceramic (seaweed and squiggle) 10" x 8" x 2.25"

Kristen Sanders' work explores life’s primordial origins and ponders the evolution of biological consciousness. Her subjects, which include fossil skulls, flint stones, seashells and prosthetics, comprise a suite of recurring motifs that Sanders uses to construct a distinct cosmology of evolutionary history. Relics of an unwritten past – early human tools, extinct companion species, the ocean’s largely unexplored biological bounty – each bears a connection to present-day life, elucidating its ontological boundaries and speaking to the enduring mysteries of our biological lineage. In this sense, Sanders works around her true subject matter – our bodies and minds – in order to better understand our relationships, not only with our natural environment, but with the deep time that precedes, envelops and awaits us.

Sanders received a BA from the University of California, Davis, and an MFA from Virginia Commonwealth University. Recent solo and two-person exhibitions include Birthmarks with David Sprecher at Stop-Gap Projects (Columbia, MO), Tide/Pool at Dreamsong, Protoself at Asya Geisberg Gallery (New York) and Early Bodies at Kathryn Brennan Gallery (New York). Her work has also been included in group exhibitions at Hair+Nails (Minneapolis); Katherine E. Nash Gallery (Minneapolis), Richard Heller (Los Angeles), Anthony Gallery (Chicago), The Hole (New York), and Good Mother (Los Angeles). She currently teaches in the Fine Arts department of
the University of Minnesota.