tears and letters...

Loving the simplicity of the work of Canadian artist Kate Jackson. I especially love the tissue piece, I won't treat my tears like tissues, in which she hand made and embroidered tissues, installed as a box if tissues with balled up used ones and crisp clean new ones waiting to be spoiled. If only all the objects that wipe our tears and tender noses were made with such beauty and love.


Kate describes the inspiration for this piece here:

Tears and snot are worthy of a handkerchief. Having spent a great deal of time crying recently and not having a hankie to catch the tears, I watched my emotions get taken out with the trash. Tears should be embraced, calmed, sweetened, and soothed. They should fall into something beautiful.

All of Kate' s series have a strong and powerful emotional edge from dealing with the loss of life in war, the news of something in a letter, to the fantasy life we never fulfill. Each work is made with an attentiveness and love of the hand made.


Her letters series is particularly powerful to me as the images she chooses to translate into embroidered drawings have so much emotional weight. I look at these figures and just want to reach out and touch them, comforting them with love or celebrating their news with laughter.


Her casualty series, a series of war figures carefully translated onto the feminine fabric of eyelet creates a powerful contrast to the violence and loss of war with the reality of the families and homes left behind.



Last night I dreamt I was... is a series that explores the fantasy lives we have and though approached with a playfulness and colorful hand in the context of the other work they have another affect - the fear of living our dreams and in the context with her war images the dreams and fantasy's that are lost with the soldiers lives.


I am inspired by her simplicity and emotional depth. You can see more of Kate's work here.

stains of the bed.

check out my interview with the very fabulous and refreshingly honest embroidery artist Louise Riley over at Mr X Stitch.

Read here.

breaking up is hard to do...

U-turn Gallery was nice enough to send some images of the install of the exhibit Breakups R Tough and give a run down of the opening. It sounds like it was a great success with a big turn out of gallery goers, some very yummy sounding food, and a very cool performance.


I wish I could have made it and am glad my sister in law and niece made it out to the opening. They said it was fun.

The gallery will be putting together a little catalogue which will be nice to see, I will be sure to let you all know when it is available.

The gallery is a such a nice, big open space. Love it.

and the performance cuddle sounded awesome. In this performance viewers could enter behind a curtain to literally cuddle for 5 minutes with the artist. Spread the love.

sewn drawings.

I fell upon the work of artist China Marks today, while researching another artist, and knew she was a perfect person to feature. Her "sewn drawings" are a collage of fantasy, fairytale, surrealism, and nature. They remind of a handful of other artists though they are completely unique as well.


Trained as a sculptor and years later introduced to the zig zag sewing machine she saw the sewing machine as just one more industrialized tool to create her wacky vision of the world.


Here she talks about how she comes up with the imagery of her fantastical work:

Process generates the imagery. I just have to show up and do the work. I start by moving around scraps of patterned fabric and paying close attention to what is happening under my hands. When something interesting comes together, I lay it on another printed fabric and sew into it. I keep sewing, making changes, picking out stitches, pulling off pieces of fabric and sewing down new scraps, sometimes even cutting the whole thing apart and reconstructing it, all in the service of the process, groping toward something I've never seen before.

Her technique reminds me a bit of the technique of Rebecca Rinquist though the imagery varies quite a bit. China even volunteers to show the back of work. (something I loved about Rebecca's work when she was in my Brooklyn exhibit and I got to see it hands on.)

but her fantasy and fairytale sensibilities as well as her multiple figures evoke a little bit of Orly Cogan's work, again very different but some thread connects them.


See more of China's work, an interview, and some process shots at her website here.

in bed, made.

a very weird angle but a peek at this pieces progress. This was a few days ago and now it is pretty much totally finished. So tomorrow I will have pics of the finished product.
I am really happy with it and it is a nice medium size that I do not work with that much.

Next I have one small and 2 larger pieces to get started. But since it is bright so late I have not been able to transfer the images yet, I need dark. So I might do that tonight, I normally teach most evenings but have taken the month of April off since I am super preggers and hoping to birth any day now, like today would just be great.

Weirdly, I have been at a loss for words for word pieces and am hoping some will come to me soon as I have a new linen that is crying out to be a text piece.

Don't forget if you make work with text to submit to my curatorial call.

potential abound.

Some interesting and varied fiber work by artist Young Cho.


The work has a fun and playful futuristic quality, though I have a hard time connecting the aesthetic from one piece to another.


Young states:

I create personal psychological narratives that originate from my personal daily experience, and the constant struggle to find my identity in a place where there is no grounded foundation. I am also interested in the distortion of the non-fiction story through self-dramatization...

I use bright colors and glossy materials to create a tone that at once seduces the viewer and disguises the subject matter. My process incorporates the use of repetition and patterns that develop organically, while suggesting a systematic approach. The pieces are labor intensive, and the struggle to complete the process becomes a visible element within the piece.



I love what is attempting to be done and would look forward to seeing the work as it matures and clarifies in its artistic voice.


See more here.

colored threads...

Here are some shots in the studio while I was prepping the work thread for install.

Yesterday I dropped off all my work, including thread, for my upcoming solo show at Corridor Gallery. Project Space.
Since, I am about to birth a babe any day now, the curator is doing the install herself... as a result I have had to prep and type out install instructions for a number of my pieces.
In general I prefer to install my work myself as I am quite particular but I have faith this show is going to be great.

I cannot wait to see it put all together.

As for now I am trying to get one last piece done so that the exhibit can have a new piece included, so to work I go.

loving hand.

Check out my post on the graceful embroidery of Walter Bruno Brix over at Hello Craft.

breakups R tough

Opening this Saturday... wish I could be there...

Breakups R Tough: a group exhibition

April 3– 24, 2010

Opening reception: Saturday, April 3^rd, 7:00 – 10:00 pm

Regular Gallery Hours: 12-4, Saturdays

Cincinnati, OH—About now, many of those relationships that were flourishing at Valentine’s Day aren’t looking so good. U·turn Art Space is pleased to announce a group exhibition that generates a wry discourse to deflate the melodrama of failed relationships. The exhibition includes Shawnee Barton, Stephanie Brooks, Alex Da Corte, Craig Damrauer, Erica Eyres, Lynne Harlow, Peter Huttinger, Eric Lebofsky, Joetta Maue, Casey Riordan Millard and Michael J. Morris.

Artists using embroidery, drawing, installation, performance, photography, sculpture and video offer different perspectives on crisis points in the human experience. Not strictly focused on just the ‘breakup’ between romantic partners, Breakups R Tough considers how interpersonal interactions cease or mutate into something more chaotic. Grafted into the dialogue are slanted looks at other stages in the quest for love, companionship and sex, such as propositions, courtship and self-pleasure. The assembled artists will address the topic with humor, wit, sexuality, physical comfort, and suggestions for remodeling our culture’s structure for types of relationships and categories of love and conflict.

http://uturnartspace.blogspot.com/

muzzled.

In a weird way without my camera to share images with all of you I feel a bit like my mouth is muzzled. I have had no working camera for over 5 days now, and it feels a bit like I have a missing limb. I never realized how important my daily documentations are to me, until now when I cannot do them.

Luckily, a friend let me borrow her camera, after all the babe may arrive any day now, so I will feel a little less of a ghost limb. I am glad because even though the last 2 days have not been especially long days in the studio they have been very constructive. I have made some great progress on my newest piece and as I prepare the last piece for my solo show, I am once again in love with the beauty of an old piece that will be re-installed as part of this exhibit.

So hopefully tomorrow some of that can be shared.