Sculptor Iris Bouwmeester (b. 1969 Schiedam) completed her training at St. Joost School of Art and Design in 1993 and went on to do a Master’s at the Sandberg Institute in Amsterdam. She has now returned to live and work in Breda. Bouwmeester initially made figurative sculptures from classic materials like bronze and clay. Later, however, she started experimenting with simple materials from the DIY store. Abstraction started to enter her work. Her sparing use of tools places the focus on her quest for beauty in the form, the lighting and the relationship between the object and the space. It seems as if Bouwmeester turns the material inside out.
The museum’s collection includes both early figurative and more recent, abstract work, like Solar 1. This sculpture appears to rotate or protrude. The material – an aluminium pipe that can be extended like an accordion – gives it a mysterious, almost extraterrestrial feel.
Iris Bouwmeester | Solar 1, 2017 | aluminium | object number: SMB000398