Nicole Wermers explores the impact that constructed environments have on our lives through various mediums including sculpture, installation, photography, and collage. Her focus is particularly on public spaces such as restaurants, museums, and shopping malls, where she highlights the relationship between designers and users. Wermers combines references to art history and culture with mass marketing and consumerism in her artworks, creating a mixture of formal considerations and societal influences. For example, she creates freestanding portals using differently shaped metal pieces that reference modernist sculpture and airport security gates. Additionally, she intervenes in the design of everyday objects like the double-bowled spoon for the refurbished café of Tate Britain. Wermers examines the structures of social relations, the symbolic meanings given to objects, and the modes of communication that they enable by reassembling and merging recognizable objects into new material compositions. Her works transform, enclose, and frame their surroundings, prompting contemplation of how surface and design signify social and cultural codes.
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