Upcycled Art Shines at Artspace

February 8, 2023 | Published by Julie Buchanan

From afar, the exhibition “Memoir and Mirrors” at Artspace Gallery resembles a wall-sized rainbow, but a closer look reveals 257 individual arrangements of little upcycled objects, each on their own 6-by-6-inch canvas.

Sandhi Schimmel Gold has been creating the assemblages for years using almost any material she has on hand. Much of it has personal meaning — the beads and rhinestones belonged to her mother and grandmother, who were jewelry makers. Some figurines and small toys belonged to her daughter, who is now 30 years old.

Junk mail, old greeting cards, game pieces, broken pottery — the list goes on. All have been turned into intricate art pieces.

These are things most people throw away.

“Everybody in my family was creative,” Schimmel Gold says. “Some things got passed down. These are all things that had some meaning, and now they have a new meaning.”

Schimmel Gold can tell a story about every object, from the old floor tiles she salvaged from an Arizona kitchen remodel to the miniature doll her parents bought her at a Chinese restaurant.

“I save everything,” Schimmel Gold says. “I save everything.”

“Memoir and Mirrors” is on display through Feb. 18, 2023, at the Artspace Gallery, 2833-A Hathaway Road, Richmond, in the Stratford Hills Shopping Center.

Category: News