Michigan artist Amber Dohrenwend uses castoff cardboard to create art

Marquette artist Amber Dohrenwend uses castoff cardboard to create large-scale scuptures. Pam LeBlanc photo

For artist Amber Dohrenwend, discarded cardboard boxes and a stash of staples add up to community and art.

The artist recently used 5,000 long skinny strips cut from shipping boxes for bicycles and 37,500 staples to build a temporary, large-scale art installation called “Bending Trees of Future Past.” Volunteers helped her put it together for an exhibit last month at Lake Effect Community Arts Center in Manistique, in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. I caught up with Dohrenwend at Graci Gallery in nearby Marquette, where she displays some of her smaller works.

“It’s about connection,” she says of her large-scale sculptures.

Read more: Ten best things about a summer trip to Michigan’s Upper Peninsula

She uses castoff materials from consumerism to make sculptures and says that each staple is a metaphor for a stitch that connects people.

“For me the challenge is getting people to see the tree inside the cardboard,” says Dohrenwend, who grew up in Marquette and lived in Japan before moving back to Michigan a few years ago.

She uses sustainable materials to create her artwork and began working with cardboard while living overseas. She gathered sheets of cardboard that neighbors had thrown away to make furniture for her children.

“I realized this was my medium,” the former teacher says.

Gradually she moved toward large-scale installations, including the one in Manistique, which was the size of a four-car garage.

Some of her smaller cardboard pieces, which look remarkably like fabric quilts, are displayed at Graci Gallery, opened by wood wall sculpture artist Joe Graci in 2020. The gallery carries paintings, sculptures, jewelry and ceramics by about 30 artists, most of whom are from the Upper Peninsula of Michigan.

“For such a small, out of the way place, we do have a lot of artists per capita,” Dohrenwend says.