December work in progress

Here are the 60 embroideries photographed as a grid. I plan to display the piece as a frieze in my critique space in January.

Here is a mock-up of the Suburban Truisms installation. I don' have enough room in my studio to photograph all the components. The piece will include the "fake" doorway with the tagged objects, the "fake" window with the security sign fabric curtains, the bulletin board with the handwritten truisms, the apron, pot holder and tote bag, the t-shirts printed with truisms, and the sign holder with truisms. 

The large textile piece with the torn fabric font is almost finished. 

Work in Progress Update

   

     The security sign fabric made into curtains and a pot holder. I'm looking for a casement window from an architectural salvage company to mount together with the curtain. The blue tape is a marker to show where the window would be. It could hang from the ceiling as a window that you can look through or on the wall as a window into a wall. The pot holder could be paired with an apron made out of the same fabric.

     This is the prototype for the security tote bag:

     This is a large textile piece (60 x 33") that is about the suburban illusion of security. It is still evolving. There will be more text written directly on the piece as well as words made with the torn fabric "font".

 
  The 60 days of embroidery is finished. I working on mounting it on strips so that it can be displayed either as a frieze or as a rectangular grid. I'll have more pictures later this week.

Some endings and beginnings:

     I've set aside most of the plaster figures for the time being accept for this one. I may do some more, focusing on the theme of  personal change and loss.

While I'm waiting for the fabric I designed with the security signs to be shipped to me, I started this  new textile piece also about suburban surveillance:

I'll be finishing the 60 embroideries and assembling them this month. I planning to create a false window with curtains made of the security sign fabric, as well as an apron, pot holder, and tote bag. The objects with the tags will be hung inside a false doorway. The truisms will be printed like fliers and placed inside a real-estate flier box.

Some experiments with words and objects:

                                     .

          These are the photos I took of security signs in my neighborhood that I manipulated with photoshop and will have printed on fabric. I've ordered a swatch so I can make any adjustments :

I  am playing with these text documents I created with photoshop:

October work in progress

Suburban truisms re-categorized:

      An earlier version printed on a t-shirt and tote bag. This needs work. I am cosidering other domestic objects to print on as well as printing individual truisms on tags attached to domestic objects.

        There are 16 different security companies with signs posted throughout my neighborhood. I am working on a photo-montage of these signs as well as locks and gated areas, that I want to print on  fabric.

          

24 more squares needed to complete the 60 days project.

     I am focusing on the use of text in my work combining words or phrases from signage or words that are significant to me.  I have revised and condensed my artist statement making it more specific:

I make art about suburban idealism. The dream of suburban bliss is a ubiquitous American value. As a white, middle class, middle-aged female I confront this dream by looking at the paradoxes I observe in my suburban environment. This includes the violence hidden in peaceful neighborhoods, and the fear of “other” that leads to isolation. I also examine my own lost innocence—my belief that the world is a safe place and there is justice for all.

In this exploration I am examining and critiqueing my relationship to popular culture, the art world, and middle-class values.

Revised Suburban Truisms

Work in progress September 2014

      I have been experimenting with a variety of projects since July. My strategy this semester is to make lots of work from an intuitive place without over-analyzing the formal elements or the meaning.

     This project involves  bodies made out of newspaper and masking tape and covered with plaster cloth. I plan to make 60 of them Eventually they will be painted, inscribed, stacked or strung together.

     This is a new iteration of the silhouettes I was working on last year. I haven't finalized what will go inside the cut out bubbles yet, but I like the black fabric with text.

Here's a detail:

Starting September first I am making one embroidered square per day for 60 days. The squares will be assembled into one quilt-like piece. I stitch thoughts or images that  occur to me each day.

I have been saving newspaper pictures from the Los Angeles Times newspaper since last year. I will stitch them randomly on long strips of fabric and display them in some kind of  scroll-like fashion. 

     

Last year I was experimenting with questions that have evolved into statements. This is my version of Jenny Holzer's Truisms: 

     After delving into Hans Haacke and institutional critique, I couldn't resist a little cynicsm of my own:

    

August Work in Progress

     
 I'm continuing to work on the three-dimensional figures, covering them with plaster cloth. Then they will be painted, inscribed or manipulated in different ways. I'm planning to make as many as I can.

I'm also playing with these collected strips of torn fabric:

Some other ideas I am playing around with are: a life-sized dimensional body made out of silk organza, kind of like a doll with no stuffing. Also a list of personal "truisms": "Don't apologize for being happy", Each day you are living you are also dying", "Having is not the same as owning", "Being idealistic is not a crime". I'm sure I will come up with more.

July Experiments

Experimental drawings

Trying a new approach with dimensional figures

Critique Space at June 2014 Residency

     The lighting and the surfaces are always a challenge when hanging your work at the Newbury Building in Boston. I was glad to have a grey background since my work in white disappears into a white wall.

     I wish I had access to an iron to flatten out the layered pieces. However, the air movement from the fans in the room did give them an active quality.

     Here are two images of the completed collaborative project that I coordinated for our group. Each member was paired with another member. Each created a small piece of art responding to this quotation by Stephen Nachmanovitch:  “The noun of self becomes a verb. This flashpoint of creation in the present moment is where work and play merge”.  The art was sent to their partner to respond to, then sent to me to compile. A red thread wove the pieces together by wrapping around the mounting pins.


 

May and June work

                                             Gross Domestic Product #3

                                             Gross Domestic Product #4

                                                    Corporations Are People


     The apron project (Gross Domestic Product) is an attempt  to present my ideas about American culture as this divided, schizophrenic structure where beliefs about American identity don't match the evidence. The transparent fabric reflects on the idea of something veiled but not  really hidden. The apron has domestic associations and the sheer  fabric suggests a sexual component. I am drawing attention to the disconnect between the image of domestic bliss and the underlying violence in American homes.

     Corporations Are People is a series of "voodoo dolls" that represent corporations. The piece reflects upon my anger about corporate greed and its negative influence on American society.

New work April 10, 2014

   

                                                         Gross Domestic Product #1

Gross Domestic Product #2

Completed Work April, 2014

Two layered and stitched textile pieces:

Female, 41 x 17"

Male, 41 x 17"

A three-dimensional fused fabric piece:

T

Layers of Self, 20 x 11 x 11"

Exhibition: "Labor-Migrant-Gulf" at Southwestern College, Chula Vista, CA

Three of my small framed pieces from last semester were included in this exhibition curated by my semester two mentor, Doris Bittar.

"Labor Migrant Gulf" explores migrant workers struggles throughout the world with pointed emphasis on workers from Central and Southeast Asia who work in the Arabian/Persian Gulf, Mexican workers on the US-Mexican border, and California’s migrant history. The exhibit at Southwestern College in Southern California joins artists from around the world to bring awareness to the human struggles of the world’s poorest laborers. A sub-theme is the artist’s identification with migrant laborers. Perhaps the artist may be one or two rung above the world’s poorest labor pools. "Labor Migrant Gulf" at Southwestern College will be organized in two parts: One part is a traditional group exhibit of about a dozen artists. The other part is collective wall of pieces made up of art from about 50 artists to form the shape of large boteh or paisley designs. The boteh/paisley is a significant ornamental design that has religious, historical, colonial, counter culture, and labor meaning and inferences. With the boteh/paisley designs we honor Asian migrants that precipitated and inspired this art exhibit. 
Doris Bittar, curator for Labor Migrant Gulf

                                      Eleanor Antin giving a reading at one of the exhibtion events

These are the two "botehs" or paisleys comprised of the work of many different artists. You can see three of my small framed pieces if you look closely.

Some new experiments with fabric and silhoettes

     

     These are some things I'm experimenting with as I reflect on the identity as a performance, as a multi-layered or fragmented structure, or as a contingent experience.