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Review: Tapestries in Conversation "Tapestry on the Edge"
By Ellen Ramsey
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To move through this exhibition was to be orchestrated through a thought provoking tapestry experience. Taking her lead from the juror's selections, Marianne Forssblad, Executive Director at the Nordic Heritage Museum, in Seattle, Washington, artfully arranged each piece to be “in conversation” with neighboring work.
The first gallery, with dark walls and dramatic lighting, was referred to by Marianne as the “peaceful” room. All the work was full of texture and the colors flowed from one piece to the next in a calm and balanced procession. Lezlie King’s large free-standing kimono, "Kiamaki," was the focal point of this gallery.. . .. King’s approach is introspective and rife with questions about identity, with the dark abstract tapestry on the inside representing the “shadow side” of the self.
Nearby hung Michael Rohde’s more extroverted interpretation of Japanese aesthetics, "Reparations." The bright colors and two dimensionality of "Reparations" stood in contrast to King’s take on the garment aspect of the kimono form. Michael interlocked his color blended rectangles to create raised vertical seams throughout, a conceptual nod to the act of repairing. The kimono shape further ties the work to the definition of the title as it refers to compensation to a country defeated in war. Similar cultural inspirations, but I enjoyed each interpretation more than twice as much by their juxtaposition in the gallery.
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below: Lezlie King, Kaimaki, 67" x 76" x 8", 2005 HV Teck, tapestry and katazonmi
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below: Michael Rohde, Reparations, 58" x 48", wool silk, natural dyes
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Joanne Sanburg’s "Gwen" and Mary Lane’s "Untitled #124" were nearly shouting at each other about the role of embellishment as a conceptual and design element.
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below: Joanne Sandburg, Gwen, 28" x 23", 2005
wool, silk, recycled silk ties, cotton, synthetic, beads, pins, earrings, feathers
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below: Mary Lane, Untitled #124, 18" x 12", 2006
tapestry and embroidery, cotton, wool, polished cotton
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And perhaps my favorite of all was the conversation between Natalie Olson’s "Searching for Eggs" and Linda Wallace’s "Implantation Series: Diminishment of Hope." Photographs do not begin to do justice to Wallace’s series involving the composting of weavings... When I finally saw this work in person, I was not prepared for how visually beautiful they are. The antique linen backing is abraded, but it is bleached to glowing. The fragment is extensively couched with lustrous cotton threads that reflect the light throughout. It is as if this meticulous act itself will somehow breathe life into the infertile seed. The presentation of the fragment becomes the metaphor for the hope and the physical embodiment of longing.
Olson’s eccentrically woven sperm imagery is the perfect complement to Wallace’s poignant decay. The white cotton sperm are visually wet with fertility. By the placement of Olson's piecee near Wallace’s work, but separated from it by the entryway to the next gallery, the potential futility of the search was not lost on the viewer.
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below: Linda Wallace, Implantation Series, Diminishment of Hope: Nongravid 4 April,
20" x 16", 2006, tapestry, earth burial, cleaning, stitching, abrasion: wool, linen
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Below: Natalie Olsen, Searching for Eggs, 23' x 25", 2003
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Read more about "Tapestry on the Edge" By Ellen Ramsey on the Next > Page
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