Melanie Wasserman

My work imagines a new, idealized reality, one built from fragments, sentimental images, broken jewelry, and materials used outside of their original intention. I incorporate found objects and jewelry that l've collected over the years, creating collages and mosaic pieces that bring together materials which otherwise might never have met. Many of the items I use were once broken or discarded, but in my hands, they're given new life.

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This process of reframing parallels my work as a psychotherapist of over 25 years. Just as I help people recontextualize the hard parts of their lives alongside the good, I approach each piece as an emotional reassembly, taking objects and materials out of their original context into a cohesive composition that creates a new world, complete and whole. The act of reframing, whether emotional or material, allows us to hold both the broken and the hopeful in the same space.

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The found objects and materials in my pieces often include family photos, taken from their frames and placed under glass bevels. Each piece is its own bright, glittery universe, and by including my family I immortalize them in this aspirational world, surrounded by beauty and embellishments

In my art, I create a new kind of reality: one where the discarded is honored, the broken is mended. and every element finds a new place in compositional harmony.