marnisaunders___
ArtEvol 2025 / Marni Saunders
LOAD , 2025 Found object sculpture 47 × 35 cm, 48 × 35 cm
Marni Saunders is an intermedia artist based in Edinburgh whose practice engages with the discarded, the dirty and the overlooked. Working with found objects and sculptural processes such as resin casting, Saunders explores themes of unseen labour, gendered work, dirt, cleanliness and the aesthetics of maintenance. The practice interrogates what society conceals, sanitises and discards, and who bears the burden of keeping environments presentable. By reclaiming what was once uncontrollable, Saunders transforms material into something held and owned, challenging silence around invisible labour and emotional weight. The work becomes both a critique of social structures and a personal journey towards acceptance, healing and freedom.
Artwork Introduction LOAD consists of two vertical washing machine drums stuffed with ‘unwanted’ hotel bed sheets, held in place with tinted Perspex and mounted on the wall. The work was inspired by a visit to an industrial hotel washhouse near Edinburgh, where Marni Saunders observed immense rotating machines filled with white bedding and towels. The collected sheets were all damaged in some way, mostly sweat stains, but still clean, creating a tension between imperfection and order. The sheets are meticulously arranged until they feel ‘correct’, reflecting a practice of confronting and making sense of what feels chaotic and uncontrollable. Conceptually, the work engages with unseen labour, both personal and societal, sustaining public and private spaces. It explores the quiet, often invisible work behind cleanliness and order in a physical, contemplative form.
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