Liz received a BFA in Fiber from the Maryland Institute College of Art (2005), and an MFA in Fiber & Material Studies from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (2013), where they taught from 2014-2018 in Fiber & Material Studies, Sculpture, and the Low-Residency MFA program.
At the heart of their work lies an embedded textile logic, a determined material engagement, scavenger impulse, and an interest in our network of entanglements with each other and the natural world through systems both visible and unseen.
As an extension of their practice, Liz has worked collaboratively to create platforms for others, including The Visitor Center Artist Camp and Sustainable Practices Symposium, an artist residency in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan and as a member of the Leadership Team for FORCE: Upsetting Rape Culture, which includes The Monument Quilt.
Ensz has received several grants for travel and research, and has exhibited their textiles and sculpture nationwide, including Franconia Sculpture Park, Shafer, MN; Smack Mellon, Brooklyn, NY; Roots and Culture Contemporary Art Center, Chicago, IL; Boston Center for the Arts, Boston, MA. Residencies include The John Michael Kohler Arts/Industry Program in Foundry, Sheboygan, WI; LATITUDE, Chicago, IL; and Blue Mountain Center, Blue Mountain Lake, NY.
ARTIST STATEMENT
My work examines designed and found icons of the American character in search of our underlying values and our aspirations as individuals and as a society. Situated in the Contemporary American Sublime, I present a comparative study of the mass-cultural investment in disposability and the human desire to imagine permanence through emblems, monuments, and commemoration. While disparate intentions inform these impulses- one to remember, and the other to quickly forget- each will materially describe our society to future generations.
My exploration of the contemporary American landscape has been fueled by a concern for material value, availability of resources, and the identification of our most abundant and untapped resource, our own waste. Our material footprint will outlive the emblems designed to signify our political and moral ideals, and stand as our lasting cultural monument.
Recent sculptural work and installation borrow from the visual language of memorial and commemoration in textiles and metals. These Anthropocene-Era Commemoratives contrast human-scale and geological-scale time and space as part of the continual unfolding and cycling of matter and the transformation of landscape. My installations are arranged differently each time they are installed, often integrating locally sourced found materials. This contemplative combination of materials becomes existential, questioning the solidity and permanence of both nature and culture, and implicating the local community in a global conversation about materials.
At the heart of my practice lies a determined material engagement, scavenger impulse, and a sincere hope for the rethinking of disposability and permanence in regards to the valuation of resources, the environment, and living things.
- Master of Fine Arts in Fiber & Material Studies, School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC), Chicago, IL
- Bachelor of Fine Arts in Fiber, (Cum Laude) Maryland Institute Collage of Art (MICA), Baltimore, MD
Professor at Maryland Institute College of Art
NAFTAE 