Steen Ipsen: Balls and Ellipses, 2019

Steen Ipsen: Balls and Ellipses, 2019

In most of my career, I have been working with modelling elements together. I was always fascinated by the patterns of geometry, which I have my own perception of, not related to a theoretical perception of geometry.

The ball elements are easy to love. People have done it for thousands of years. The fascination of the shape of the sun, the moon and all the planets are well known, and the ball is connected to the fascination of the circle. The ball is used for toys, sports and lives in many contexts. The ball has given me a great modelling possibility to work with. So, I think, I will never leave the ball elements. As you can see over several years, my works with balls have been more and more refined and I enjoy that they can still inspire me. I’ll see how far can I go in the modelling process without failing.

I had considered for a long time whether I could put a new element into play. And the ellipse is an obvious form but it took time to realize it. The ellipse can be regarded as a ball that you pull in. I found out that the ellipses with their directional shape are different to model compared with the balls, but it is also exciting to model a new form with which I can see great potential.

For both types of elements, I first make the balls and ellipses in different sizes before I model and build up the sculptures. I never used any kind of computer technique or other kind of digital techniques. All my sculptures are hand-built.