Irmela Maier. The Wolf, the Polar Bear, the Monkeys, and the Boat

Irmela Maier transforms recycled materials, wire mesh, baked clay, and hair-thin copper wires into animal sculptures. One of the joys of designing this book of images was to activate the tactile and sculptural characteristics of the works via the visual material. Assembled into small sequences of movement, the images act to imbue the immobilized animals with a vibrant something. This visual concept led to a surprising twist: as I came to understand the photographs as optical studies, the possibility of including freehand pencil sketches from the artist’s design stages offered itself. This first-ever gathering of her animal sculptures takes place in a hardcover book that is pliable, lively, and soft in the hand.