Andrea La Valleur-Purvis

Lives and works in Waco, TX, USA

Artist statement

Steel is a forgiving material. If I cut something, I can weld it back together. If I bend something with heat, I can return it to its previous shape — not seamlessly, but that’s the point. I want the decisions to be indelible. My sculptures begin as flat sheets. The curves and shapes emerge from removing material from a plane, from heat, from the mark of what was tried and reconsidered. Some welds stay visible. The process stays in the work. Each piece rests on a small, precise point. Most elements move when you touch them — I want you to touch them. Walk around. The sculpture has more than one shape; it rewards the step it takes to find out. A new angle, a new surface, a new color catches the light differently. That’s intentional. The forms come from a question I’ve been living with for a long time: what does it feel like to hold irresolvable forces — rigidity and flexibility, stability and change — without collapsing the tension into a resolution? I grew up across British, German, and American contexts, watching how pressure accumulates around identity, how people navigate what they’re expected to become. The sculptures don’t illustrate that. But they come from it. Equilibrium, in this work, is not a destination. It is a practice — intentional, ongoing, staying in the question.

Artwork