Hannah Bennett
Limestone and Pink Sky diptych

Media: handmade paper
Size: 10" x 12" x .25"
$500

Artist Statement:
This work uses the materiality of paper to contemplate the Midwestern landscape that is the inspiration for my work. I like simple, natural materials--threads, a few kinds of paper pulp, sewing needles. This is fortunate. When the pandemic came, I was not at a loss for how to occupy my hands because I had no need for machinery that doesn't fit in an apartment. I could sit with my small pieces of translucent paper and stitch into them for hours.

My work has always been inspired by biological and geological forces, things that exist whether human beings are around or not. I grew up in Kansas, a place where the sky is big and broad, and the land is full of fossils. Handmade paper in particular is useful for making work that is related to fossils. At least in Kansas, fossils began in wetness and fluidity eons ago, when the prairies were a shallow sea. Now, moments of fluidity are captured in the stillness of rock. Paper, manipulated wet, when dry retains that sense of fluidity.

Biography

Hannah O’Hare Bennett is an artist, papermaker and educator based in Madison WI. She holds a BFA in Printmaking from the University of Kansas (1998) and an MFA in Design Studies from the University of Wisconsin Madison (2017). Between those degrees, she worked as a farmer, Peace Corps Volunteer (Ecuador, 2004-2006), and produce manager, manual labor that informs her subject matter and manner of creating art. She has done many residencies in the last three years, including at Women’s Studio Workshop (NY), StudioWorks at the Tides Institute (ME), and The Textile Arts Center in Manhattan, and has taught at the Morgan Conservatory and the Minnesota Center for Book Arts. Her work has been shown across the country in group and solo shows, and has been featured in the Surface Design Association Journal. In 2019, her work was selected for inclusion in Handpapermaking Magazine’s Portfolio 13, In Between. She now serves on the board of North American Hand Papermakers and edits the organization publication, Bull & Branch. She adjuncts at Mount Mary University in Milwaukee, and before the pandemic, worked as a substitute teacher for the Madison Metropolitan School District.