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Leonard Ursachi

Romanian-American, born 1956

BiographyUrsachi says "I am a Romanian-born artist. I grew up under a dictatorship, from which I defected, and spent years border-hopping before settling in New York. My art reflects our contemporary world of porous borders, vulnerable shelters, and mutating identities.

My sculptures and installations use architectural references as tropes for systems that enclose and exclude, protect and reject. I’m interested in the boundaries systems create and how those boundaries are transgressed. I’m interested in the impact of structures – material, theoretical, social, political – on individuals and communities.

Several of my sculptures are in the form of bunkers. Human-scale, woven of willow branches or covered in feathers, they are as much about longing for home as they are about conflict.

Some of my sculptures borrow the form of wells. The well is a shared resource and social gathering place. Its iconography is mythic—the source from which life and knowledge spring; a receptacle for our desires (throw in a coin and make a wish).

Much of my work is site-specific—the physical, historical and cultural aspects of the site inform my concept and use of material. I enjoy showing not only in museums and galleries but also in public spaces, where my work reaches audiences both in and outside the art world. In that context, my work not only addresses issues of boundaries, but embodies them."

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