The close relationship between art and everyday life is integral to the work of Marisa Merz.

"There has never been any division between my life and my work", Merz has said. The idea of home as a private, intimate and feminine realm is particularly important for her. In 1966, for example, she created the spectacular work Untitled (Living Sculpture), both for her own house and as a gallery installation. It was made from thin strips of shiny aluminium, clipped together and suspended from the ceiling to form great coiled and spiralling forms, inviting us to explore the relationship between material and space.

She often utilises traditional handcraft techniques and practices associated with female domesticity, such as knitting. In 1968, she began to knit nylon or copper threads into simple geometric shapes, combining industrial strength materials with a delicate, domestic process. Untitled (Little shoe) is one of a series of nylon-thread shoes which were often made to the size of the artist's feet, thus acting as an extension of her body. These delicate, web-like knitted works have been hung on the gallery wall or placed in external locations such as beaches. This interweaving of threads into a complicated network implies both an obsessive energy and ideas of communication and interconnection.

Marisa Merz was born in 1931 in Turin, where she lives and works.

Curated by Ann Coxon