Shotz's sculptures and installations manipulate ordinary synthetic materials—optical lenses, mirrors, glass, piano strings, wire, beads, nails—in concert with physical forces in order to investigate the shaping of perception, experiential boundaries, and ephemeral phenomena. She combines craftsmanship and process-intensive methods of accumulation and structure-building, often based in underlying concepts from physics, optics and mathematics. They evoke both natural sensations and scientific models, while blurring the ability to distinguish human-made from organic materials. The blend of minimal and organic forms in her art has been compared to that of
Eva Hesse, however, she differs in her interest in the viewer as a participant; that emphasis has been related to the conceptual work of
Lygia Clark, though Shotz's entails a more optical than physical participation. in exhibitions at the
Aldrich Museum of Contemporary Art,
MoMA PS1 and
MASS MoCA.
The New Art Examiner described her solo exhibition at Susan Inglett (1999) as displaying a "fascination with nature that's part childlike wonder, part humorous romp, and part clinical investigation." It included a digital photo of collaged budding flowers suggesting genetic engineering, a video, and
Pink Swarm, one of two shimmering, suspended topiary- or cloud-like sculptures made of plastic, wire and clear surgical tubing. and "genetically mutated lily pads and beanstalks." In 2003, she created "Mirror Fence" at the
Socrates Sculpture Park, a shimmering, three-by-130-foot-long picket fence faced in mirrors, whose slats disappeared and reappeared amid the surrounding landscape as viewers approached. In subsequent exhibitions, Shotz presented abstract sculptures characterized as updated
postminimalism "with a dash of pop science." Their shimmering responses to changing sunlight evoked patterns ranging from natural (the sun on rippling water) to human-made (fabric,
chain mail) to digital (screen pixels). The
Imaginary Sculptures series (2014) eschewed materials altogether by simply visualizing possible sculptures with
haiku-like imperatives inscribed on enameled wall plaques. ==Public commissions==