Austin Ballard’s practice offers a platform for questioning our heavily designed lived environments by merging them with those objects and places that often appear uncategorized, unstable and inhospitable. Serving as a connection of man-made architecture and the natural landscape, his sculptures balance our relationships to these settings through a diversity of imagery, materials and sophisticated construction.
At MAD, Ballard will work on new mixed media sculptural work that mingles craft and design through an array of materials and processes that address the intersections between art object, vessel and architectural model. Evoking digital imagery and handcrafted techniques, these works combine woven cane and reed with putty and hand dyed plywood.
Ballard received his MFA from the Rhode Island School of Design, a Teaching Certificate from the RISD/Sheridan Center at Brown University, and his BFA from the University of North Carolina in Charlotte. Ballard has been featured in several international exhibitions, received numerous awards and residencies, and served as an instructor in both textiles and sculpture. For more information please visit his website: www.austinballard.com
