Elise Marie Martin is an interdisciplinary artist, based in Detroit, MI, USA. She seeks to make work that encourages engagement and interaction while questioning our relationship with objects. Martin received her BFA from the College for Creative Studies, and her MFA from Wayne State University. Her studio practice is complemented by her work in art education and art-based community programs.

As a maker of objects, I have become very interested in the power of inanimate things to influence behavior or mediate relationships. In my studio practice, I try to create interactive sculptural works that tiptoe the line between the passive objects and active participants. During the Covid-19 pandemic, I began making furniture objects in my own likeness, as a way of exploring my role as an introverted empath. The idea was that these objects could act as my stand-in, offering intimacy and emotional support to others at times when I couldn’t be physically present or didn’t have the energy to be emotionally present.

My work is often driven by my love of material; In my studio, I like to surround myself with tactile materials that seem to invite interaction and encourage engagement. I am particularly drawn to the familiar domestic art and slow handicraft practices, materials, and processes that inherently show a lot of care and attention. I then seek to push those processes beyond the conventional means of production, altering things just enough to create an uncanny experience and subvert the viewer’s expectations of how an object should behave.