Nancy Rubins is known for large-scale public sculptures, including Agrifolia Majoris (2017), which she installed in Chicago, on the shores of Lake Michigan in 2022. In Diversifolia #1, a smaller-scaled work related to Agrifolia Majoris, animals of all types are flung into the air, with legs, tails, horns, and antlers splayed in every direction.
Rubins began to work with found materials in the late 1970s, focusing on objects she could acquire in bulk. In Agrifolia Majoris, cast metal animal figures intended to adorn playgrounds or gardens are assembled in an unsettling profusion. Wrested away from their original uses, the objects are subsumed into an expressive abstract sculpture. Rubins first modeled Diversifolia #1 in clay and then cast it in bronze, imparting a sense of tactility and immediacy.