Meet Ella

Ella Ermgodts is a student artist pursuing a Bachelor of Fine Arts at The University of Montana. Her work focuses on her identity and the relationship she has with the world around her. She uses a variety of sculptural mediums to bring her ideas to life, including metal casting, forge work, and textile arts. She has also started using multiple printmaking techniques to illustrate her ideas.
Ella was born and has lived the majority of her life in the suburbs of Kansas City, Kansas. She is currently based in Missoula, Montana, and the move has heavily influenced her art by incorporating more Western motifs and themes. The change in environment has also given her new experiences to explore through her work.

In Ella’s recent work, she has been using combinations of steel, wood, and textiles to communicate her relationship with identity. Her work often uses bright colors and found objects to create recognizable and symbolic forms. She is interested in taking familiar objects and materials and using them in ways that give them a new meaning.
Ella uses her work as an outlet for topics in her life that she struggles to communicate in a traditional way. She uses the process of making to work through her thoughts surrounding the topic of each piece. Her work becomes a physical representation of her thought process and the things she is trying to understand.

Her recent work has focused on exploring identity and finding her place in the world. Her practice continues to evolve through experimentation with bronze and pewter casting, printmaking, and other sculptural processes while remaining grounded in an interest in self-discovery.
Through her work, Ella hopes to create experiences that feel personally meaningful while still being open to broader interpretation.