Chateau Mathieu, a private residence in Normandy, France was built in the latter part of the 18th century. In June of 2009, I and five other colleagues had the opportunity to work at the chateau in a two-week experimental residency to research and create new contemporary artworks that responded directly to the history of the site.
My particular interest was in the matrilineal legacy of the chateau itself. I wanted to explore ideas of the private and public as they applied to women during the Victorian era. Within wealthy families, women were, for the most part, relegated to the private sphere of the home where they spent their time embroidering in the sitting room and entertaining guests at the piano. At the same time, their poor rural counterparts were moving to the city and becoming part of the public workforce instigated by mechanization, mass production and the industrial revolution. Through the use of embroidery as well as the use of rich fabrics referencing the opulent domestic interiors of these “ladies of leisure”it was my intention to speak to these women’s isolation, lack of agency and stifled creativity through subversive means. I created pieces to specifically install in various locations in the chateau. As well, over the course of the residency I created a number of site-specific works on the grounds of the chateau that I sometimes refer to as “exterior decorating”. I have presented these experimental works here in the context of various chateau locations.
A collaborative bookwork based on this residency is currently in progress and a culminating exhibition will be presented at the Esplanade Art Gallery in Medicine Hat, Alberta in the fall of 2012.
Visit the Artist’s website HERE
Poplar Gallery.Online invites you to view Lot 175: A Box of Household Linens in gallery1 from December 12, 2009 to April 4, 2010.
In the fall term of 2008, students of Textile Practice: A Cultural Survey taught by Dr Jennifer Salahub at the Alberta College of Art + Design were each given a piece of “antique” household linen purchased from an estate auction. Each student was to consider and create a finished work based on a personal response to the linens. This project brings together the twelve interpretations, showcasing the diversity of individual practices and techniques. Read the curatorial essay by Dr Jennifer Salahub HERE.
Participating artists: Margaret Abrams, Jennifer Akkermans, Julie Baratta, Mary Anne Clarke, Anne Fetterly, Aisling Macken, Heather Murray, Vanessa Riego, Romy Straathoff, Rebecca Taylor, Jasmine Valentina and Michael Yung.
Anjani Khanna’s exhibition of figurative ceramics Myth and Memory continues until February 5 in gallery2.
Aisling Macken’s embroideries and needlepoint lace pieces reference the Fibonacci Sequence and the connections between the mathematical number sequence and the natural world. She is a recent graduate from the Alberta College of Art + Design Fibre Department and is based in Calgary Alberta.
The ArtClothText FEATURED page is reserved for emerging artists. Submit your work today! Email info@mackenziefrere.com
November 1 to 14, 2009
Marion Nicoll Gallery | ACAD
Opening Reception November 12, 2009 | 500 to 800 pm
In the fall term of 2008, Dr. Jennifer Salahub’s students of Textile Practice: A Cultural Survey, were each given a piece of “antique” household linen purchased from an estate auction. Each student was to consider and create a finished work based on a personal response to the linens and our individual research papers. This project brings together the twelve interpretations, showcasing the diversity of individual practices and techniques.
Look out for a version of this exhibition at Poplar Gallery.Online December 12, 2009.
View Dana Roman’s WEBSITE
Doug Jones’ installation ‘Non sum qualis eram’ (‘I am not what I used to be’) is currently on show at the Phoenix Arts Centre, Exeter, Devon. He is a recent Fine Art graduate and this is his second solo show in the UK. Child size bishops in beautifully sewn, decorated and printed vestments, complete with ornate and faceless mitres, fill one gallery space.
In another gallery a number of full size black garbed bishops with embroidered motifs, including skulls, are placed around a miniscule white wooden bed. Gallery notes refer to the artist as a chorister in his youth amidst Anglican clergy and having a fascination with the symbolism and iconography of the uniform and in turn authority. I was initially interested in seeing this particular show because I had read of his use and incorporation of authentic church braiding and decoration. I’d love to know how he acquired these particular items. The installation itself is striking, sinister, offbeat. It is also irreverent incorporating hip hop imagery, leopard skin prints and religious iconography. Interesting to see a subsequent show and to see if these ‘motifs’ persist.
“Nom sum qualis eram” runs from April 24 to May 31, 2009 at the Phoenix Arts Centre.
I want to tell you everything Andrea Vander Kooij
Review by Diane Dechief
At an initial glance,
Vander Kooij’s current exhibition, I want to tell you everything, seems confessional: an embroidered tell-all on a variety of household fabrics, including full-sized bed sheets. Serving as canvasses with a variety of opacity, these sheets range from plain white flannel to ones featuring toys from the ‘80s (think Smurfs, Star Wars and My Little Ponies). On these surfaces Vander Kooij tells us stories that are emotional, descriptive, and sometimes instructional, all in her unfailingly perfect, yet equally expressive, embroidery and appliqué techniques.
After a few minutes at the show, the notion of confession is set aside as the subtleties of Vander Kooij’s work come through. This is not an uncomfortable experience where someone you barely know has revealed too much and all you have done is nod and smile. Instead, in Vander Kooij we find an engaging conversationalist with a flair for wit and play. The ways that she initiates this dialogue are for me the most intriguing element of the show.
Sac Noir Hand embroidery on cotton. 27” x 23”, 2008.
Note found on the street taped to a garbage can, enlarged and embroidered.
As one example, two of the show’s pieces (Telephoner and Sac Noir) are embroidered facsimiles of hastily scribbled notes found by the artist. Vander Kooij’s renditions capture the speed of the hands that wrote these notes in the original, mundane moments that they were created. That Vander Kooij’s has done so with the painstaking effort of a needle and thread in her own hand reifies the already unusual messages contained in the notes.
Rivalry, a colourful, quilted piece, serves up the same messages at two levels. I found myself intrigued by the details of the work and it wasn’t until I had moved along to the show’s final pieces that the macro level of Rivalry was obvious to me. It was then that I received Vander Kooij’s unexpected pun.
Misconception Embroidery and appliqué on vintage table cloth. 52.5” x 57.5”, 2008
One consideration of hanging large bed sheets in the middle of a gallery is that they have two sides, and Vander Kooij works this element to its full advantage. Part of the playfulness of the exhibition is finding yourself on one side of a sheet wondering how the other side looks. How visible are the stitches? Can you see any of the rough bits? Vander Kooij is a pro, so we only see what she wants us to. Misconception, the piece that had the greatest impact on me, is also the best example of this form of double-sided play. On one side we see an embroidered, expectant mother in a style from the 1960s. On the second side, we are privy to a view of the curious fetus growing inside the calm and seemingly oblivious woman on the other side.
Misconception (detail)
Because Vander Kooij’s playfulness tends to have us smirking or puzzling things out, it is possible to forget the fineness of the medium that she is working in. Bloom is a piece that showcases the beauty of Vander Kooij’s artistry. Although Bloom’s origins are notable, I find in this piece, one opportunity to pause and focus on Vander Kooij’s remarkable skills.
Leaving the show, I had the satisfying, full feeling of having shared a great conversation with a friend over a cup of coffee. Praise to Vander Kooij for initiating this unforgettable dialogue! I look forward to our next conversation.
submitted by Dianne Dechief
DIAGONALE
Centre des arts et des fibres du Québec
5455, avenue De Gaspé, espace 203,
Montréal, Québec H2T 3B3, Canada
Métro Laurier, sortie rue Laurier
Open Wednesday to Saturday, noon to 5:00 pm until November 29, 2008
OPENING TODAY!
Vernissage: Saturday, November 1st, 2-5 pm
DIAGONALE, Centre des arts et des fibres du Québec5455, avenue De Gaspé, espace 203 Montréal, Québec, Canada
Métro Laurier, sortie rue LaurierOuvert du mercredi au samedi de 12 à 17h.
View more of Vander Kooij's work HERE
Wendy Toogood A Nakusp Narrative
September 5th – October 4th, 2008
Stride Gallery, 1004 Macleod Trail SE, Calgary, Alberta phone 403-262-8507
“Art that addresses and incorporates the everyday is inherently political in that it asserts the subjectivity and experience of the overlooked against the ideological weight of the powerful and socially vested. In making such work, one must be open to chance encounters, stray attachments, surprising challenges and reflection.”
READ MORE of the text by Amy Gogarty
Poplar ArtCraft is pleased to present Navigating, an exhibition of work by Vancouver artist Bettina Matzkuhn in gallery2.
Matzkuhn writes, “Embroidery is a language of extreme detail with the possibility of exaggeration. Cartography shares this history and aesthetic as every map is an edited version of geography and events, and is subject to further revision. In this exhibit, I am creating markers in a personal geography made of thread and metaphor.”
Crafting a Perfect Dinner Party with Decorative Diplomacy (A Locke Rozene Project) continues in
gallery1 until May 2, 2008.
Poplar Gallery.Online
CARE Canada
