Lauren Kitts is a sculptor living in the Tasman area at the top of the South Island who works mostly in stone but also in bronze and wood.Lauren has gained international recognition as a professional sculptor over the last 30 years. She exhibits on a regular basis and now has her own sculpture gallery in the Tasman area on her 13 acre property.Her inspiration is the natural world where form and all its complexities abound. She explores the connection between the material world and the “unseen” and is concerned with the nature of uncertainty and man made climate change, which is expressed in many of her new works.Lauren has a fascinating practice and I really loved hearing her story. We talk about her deep connection with stone and her passion for form, how she sources some of the stone she uses from a local river and Takaka Mountain, her stone carving process, the tools she uses and the endless source of inspiration she gets from positive and negative form.https://laurenkitts.co.nz/   https://www.instagram.com/laurenkitts/  https://www.facebook.com/people/Sculpture-by-Lauren-Kitts/ About your host: https://www.instagram.com/creative_matters/Mandy Jakich is the Founder and CEO of Creative Matters, an award winning business providing creative, educational opportunities to enrich the lives of our children, educators, artists and community. https://www.creativematters.co.nz/Mandy is a practising artist www.amandajakich.co.nz and a teacher, with more than 30 years experience teaching in various capacities at primary and intermediate schools across Auckland NZ and as an art educator at Auckland Art Gallery.As well as this podcast, Creative Matters  facilitate Professional Development visual arts courses for primary teachers, visual art creative workshops and experiences for children and public art projects and creative opportunities  in the community.Ngā mihi, thanks for listening!See the artist's work on our blog https://www.creativematters.co.nz/blog You can follow us for updates on https://www.instagram.com/creativematterspodcast/ Please rate and review our show to help others find us https://podcasts.apple.com/nz/podcast/creative-matters/id1561034043