Words with Friends | Melissa Borrell

Melissa Borrell: Finding Art in Sacred Geometry

Melissa Borrell is a multimedia artist who began her career making jewelry as a RISD grad. Seeing how the geometric shapes of her jewelry played with light and shadow, she began to expand into large-scale sculptural pieces. Her work includes 3D wall installations as well as immersive works enveloping multiple rooms. The artist recently sat down with APP to discuss current projects, inspiration, and dreams for the future.

APP: Hi Melissa! We really love the sculpture you made for us at The Wave Hotel in Lake Nona, Florida. It seems to be lit from within, but it’s not. How did you create that effect?

MB: I’m working a lot lately with laser cut acrylic in bright colors, and for that piece I used an “edge glow” acrylic. It is similar to fiber optics, taking ambient light in and then concentrating it on the edges. I called that piece TetraHedonism, playing on the geometric shapes that I used, and the indulgences that can be experienced at the Lake Nona Wave Hotel. I love how the bright acrylic pieces create new colors when layered together.

APP: Since your shapes are very abstract, where do you get your inspiration?  Are you referencing anything specific?

MB: I look at things in nature, plants for example, and see how they build forms and connections at a cellular level. I’m inspired by Charles and Rae Eames “The Power Of Ten” Video (you can see it on Youtube). Right now I’m doing a piece for a chemical engineering company, and I’m looking at chemistry to inform the shapes I will create.

APP: What is the wildest project you have worked on?

MB: I’m part of an artist collective called Vision Gland, and we made an immersive environment called KaleidoscopiCave. It was made out of Mylar, and had several rooms, so you could wander through it. Inspired greatly by geometric abstraction, I played with different forms and angles of the three-dimensional space.



APP: What is your dream project?

MB: I’d like to design a playground. I like for my work to be kinetic, functional, and interactive, which is why I like to design jewelry, but I’m more and more interested in bigger scale. I’ve already created a design for an outdoor bench, but a play space is definitely a dream of mine.

To learn more about Melissa’s work, please visit her website

melissaborrell.com