From hearts that embody love and powerful energy, to crosses that speak of faith and the power of prayer, and rats sculpted from clay & salvaged beer cans, Michel Keck transforms forgotten materials into meaningful works of art. Her rats, holding their own picket signs, speak out against the cruelty of animal testing—turning a symbol of mockery into one of defiance and satire.
Hearts are a recurring motif in Keck’s collage, mixed-media, and found-object assemblages—a reflection of her fascination with the heart as both a symbol and a source of creative power. Inspired by years of studying the work of the HeartMath Institute and the research of thinkers like Joe Dispenza on heart/brain coherence, she is captivated by the extraordinary potential unlocked when heart and mind align—capable of intuition, emotional clarity, and even the reversal of disease.
The more she explored this connection, the more she gravitated toward heart-centered assemblages using found and salvaged objects. While some may dismiss working with symbols as simple as crosses or hearts as cliché, Keck turns that notion on its head—showing them in ways entirely her own. The naysayers’ doubts roll off her as she creates not what others expect, but what she feels called to make, transforming discarded materials into works of power, meaning, and resonance.
