We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Leah Aripotch. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Leah below.
Leah, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. We’d love to hear about the best boss, mentor, or leader you’ve ever worked with.
I’ve been very fortunate to have had many amazing mentors over the years, but my first real boss out of art school, Brian Martin, is very important to me. Brian had a fabrication shop in San Francisco. We were mostly building high-end furniture and architectural pieces. When I graduated from art school, I lost access to a lot of equipment I was using to build my sculptures. But the day I started working for Brian, he gave me a key to his shop and encouraged me to work on my sculptures when I wasn’t working for the business. He has such a unique mind and really is the best fabricator I’ve ever known. He taught me everything he could and made me the fabricator I am today.
As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?
I’m a metal sculptor that builds mostly monsters, aliens and botanical forms. I found my way to metal sculpture through art school. Originally a painting major, I gravitated towards sculpture and then eventually specialized in metal arts. My work is sort of an unusual approach to metal in that I tend to treat it like clay, resulting in very lifelike organic creatures. I forge, weld, and grind my sculptures into existence. It is a highly technical art practice, which I enjoy thoroughly. I really like to push the boundaries of what I think is possible with the material. I’m most proud when I hear that I’m inspiring other metal artists. I was told recently by a director of a prestigious international metal arts school that my work comes up often when the students have to submit source material for their inspiration. That meant the world to me.
We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.
Back in 2020, I competed in a metal art competition show on Netflix called Metal Shop Masters. And I did terribly. I was really reticent to do the show in the first place, since my personality is not really the type to want to appear on a reality TV show not to mention the logistical challenges involved given COVID. But, and I think a lot of artists can relate to this, ultimately you do what you need to do to get your work out there. Another big motivator for me was wanting young girls at home that are watching to see more women represented in the field. In any case, I was on the bottom on the first episode, and sent home on the second. My work and concepts were rejected quite publicly and it was a pretty brutal experience. But I was not defeated. The truth is that failure is a big part of my world and a critical part of what it means to grow as an artist. The silver lining though is that I went on to achieve some really important milestones in my career in the past two years since filming the show, and have been blessed to really expand my network and visibility, and to focus on developing new skills and experimenting in new directions..
What’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative in your experience?
The most rewarding aspect of being an artist, for me, is the way it allows me to connect with other people. I love the idea of putting work out into the ether and it registering on a visceral level, particularly in the era of Instagram when you can get almost instantaneous feedback about a piece. Connecting with people who understand the process of forging and welding and what goes into my work is also hugely rewarding.
Contact Info:
- Website: Leaharipotch.com
- Instagram: @Leaharipotch