Marsha Borden
Bed of Roses
2025
As a figure of speech, the expression “a bed of roses” has been around since the mid-1500’s. Its figurative use refers to a life of luxury and leisure. When something is “a bed of roses,” it means it is easy, comfortable, or sumptuous. The wrought iron bed in this installation is decorated with a bedding of multi-colored, hand-crocheted roses on a crocheted blue lattice background. The bedding is made of low density polyethylene (LDPE), a type of thin plastic used to make newspaper bags. Approximately 1,000 plastic bags were individually hand-cut, hand-pieced, and crocheted by hand for this installation. It is estimated that one trillion plastic bags are used and discarded worldwide annually, and that 90% of all plastic bags and wraps are not recycled and end up in landfills or in the ocean. It takes anywhere from 500 to 1,000 years for a plastic bag to degrade, eventually becoming microplastics that continue to pollute the environment.
For the duration of this three-month Open Air 2025 installation at UCONN Avery Point, A Bed of Roses will be exposed to the windy, sunny, salty, rainy conditions of the Connecticut shoreline. How the piece responds to the elements is part of the design of this installation, but it is expected that since plastic is forever, there will be no change. Because while plastic has made our lives easier, it is simultaneously destroying our bodies, our wildlife, and our planet. But we have made our bed, and now we have to lie in it.
About the Artist
Marsha Borden is a New Haven County, Connecticut-based American artist who works primarily in textile-based mediums. Borden has accomplished close to a dozen solo, invitational, and site-specific installations over the past nine years, and her work has been juried into numerous local and national exhibitions. She was Artist-in-Residence at Ely Center of Contemporary Art (2019) and at Common Ground Urban Farm and Environmental Education Center (2020), both in New Haven, Connecticut. Borden was awarded the 2022 Connecticut Sea Grant Arts Support Award for her artistic work with Harmful Algal Blooms (HABs). A highlight of her 2024 solo exhibition for the Connecticut Department of Energy and Environmental Protection at the Kellogg Environmental Center was a large-scale sculpture of the Diamondback Terrapin, a state species of special concern. A juried artist and current board member of the Guilford Art League, Borden is on the faculty at Guilford Art Center in Guilford, Connecticut and is a frequent Teaching Artist with Connecticut Public Libraries. Her work has been featured in several print and online publications, including the Hartford Courant, the New Haven Independent, The Arts Paper of the Arts Council of New Haven, and the Guilford Courier. Borden holds a Bachelor of Science degree, a Master of Science Degree, and a Sixth-Year Diploma (pre-doctoral level) in Psychology. She has recently studied at Rhode Island School of Design in Providence, Rhode Island. Born and raised in upstate New York, Borden currently works from her studio in Erector Square, an artist’s enclave in New Haven, Connecticut.
Website/Instagram
@marshamakes