ANDREA MANDER
Copper Artist
Copper is among the first metals mined and utilized by humans for both practical and ornamental purposes. It is historically symbolic of love and universal ideas of life and has been associated with the planet Venus and femininity. Present-day, copper carries our electricity and our water and protects us on rooftops and the paint of ship hulls. An essential element for life, it is highly conductive, Ayurvedic, and naturally antimicrobial.
It humbly serves us and protects us, as the Mother does. You could say it is full of lady magic.
My copper work is a conscious study of divine femininity and eternal love through sacred spirals and deep grooves in thin sheets of the metal (and sometimes wire, or pipes). Each piece is a meditation in patience and grit, the process often taking months or even years to complete. With this media, I feel I am able to express a full range of my emotional experiences from joy to heartbreak, rendered deliberately tender or with determined might. In copper I hope to convey a connection to our shared humanity, a remembering of the Sacred Mother who carries us all quietly along.
"There is no such thing as permanence, only temporary and extended degrees of significance and substance."