HELEN GRIMM

For more than twenty years, shells have been a wellspring of inspiration for her work, those small, often overlooked forms that hold such striking contradictions. She is endlessly fascinated by the way their humble, weathered exteriors, marked by worm holes and time, contrast with the polished, jewel-like beauty inside. The bleached, bone-like surfaces set against bursts of vibrant color create a tension she finds endlessly compelling.

Her early focus was almost exclusively on these treasures of the shore. She explored them as both landscapes and intimate miniatures, navigating the delicate balance between representation and abstraction. There is something deeply soothing about their shapes, which is why she is drawn to magnifying these palm-sized wonders into large-scale works that can envelop a wall.

Returning again and again to shells, she finds new paths to explore lines, shapes, and scale, always pushing further into abstraction. These paintings often evoke the experience of looking underwater, a world where forms are elusive and shifting, where one may not quite see the object itself, but senses its essence beneath the surface.