MEMORY MEMORY - Gladstone Hotel

M
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EMORY
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10 :
The Gladstone Hotel’s 10th Annual Juried
Textile and Fibre Arts Exhibition
August 27–December 27, 2015
M
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EMORY
OMEM
10 :
HARD TWIST 10: MEMORY
The Gladstone Hotel’s 10th Annual Juried Textile and
Fibre Arts Exhibition
The tenth annual edition of the Gladstone Hotel’s signature show
of textile-based art explores the many complex relationships
between cloth and memory.
Memory winds its way through textiles, a constant thread that
runs through the earliest archaeological fragments, the latest
experimental synthetics and everything in between. Textiles hold
memory, recall memory, record — and occasionally obscure —
memory. In some recent incarnations they even have memory.
Hard Twist has become an important annual event within the
Canadian textile art community as well as a signature event for
the Gladstone.
HARD TWIST 10 jURORS:
Melanie Egan: Head of Craft and Design, H
arbourfront Centre
Elizabeth Elliott: Textile Artist, Toronto
Sarah Quinton: Curatorial Director, T
extile Museum of Canada
HARD TWIST 10 CURATORS:
Helena Frei and Chris Mitchell
Exhibition Coordination by Lukus Toane
Catalogue designed by Allison Chan
4
ALEC SUTHERLAND
www.nutshellarcade.com
I’m an artist who specializes in knitting and weaving and am currently
studying at the Montréal Centre for Contemporary Textiles. I’m interested in
the process, production, and perception of textiles in both historical and
modern contexts. My work subverts the traditional ideas of function and
style in craft.
Reworn
FAIR ISLE TOQUE
RED SWEATER
Wool
11.5” x 8”
2015
Wool
20” x 24”
2015
Reworn is a series of reconstructions of textiles based on old
childhood photographs. They explore how the photographs
we take distort and define our memories of people, places and
things. They also contrast the intangible, fluid nature of memory
with the static, anachronistic nature of photography.
5
ANDREA VANDER KOOIJ
www.andreavanderkooij.com
Andrea Vander Kooij is a fibre and performance artist who holds an MFA
degree from Concordia University. Her practice incorporates traditional
craft-based mediums such as knitting, quilting and embroidery as well as
elements of performance. Her work addresses gender issues and the body
as well as challenging notions of art, craft, and labour.
The Mend Collection
BLUE FLORAL MEND
PURPLE FLORAL MEND
Found, mended bed sheet, laced
over wooden support
14” x 19” x 1.75”
2015
Found, mended bed sheet, laced
over wooden support,
14” x 16” x 1.75”
2015
DRESS MEND
SMURF SHEET MEND
Found, mended dress, laced over
wooden support,
10” x 12” x 1.75”
2015
Found, mended bed sheet, laced
over wooden support
8” x 10 ‘ x 1.75”
2015
PINK BLANKET MEND
Found, mended blanket, laced
over wooden support
9” x 7” x 1.75”
2015
The Mend Collection is a small group of found, mended textiles. Worn to
soft colours and mended with varying levels of skill, they evoke a dutiful
domesticity, and a time when commodity was scarcer then it is now. The act
of mending transforms the industrially produced sheets and blankets into
unique items, allowing each of them to function metaphorically as a visual
and tactile memory of the life of the user. Each item has been hand laced to
fit over wooden stretchers.
6
ANDREW MACDONALD
www.andrewmacdonald.ca
Andrew MacDonald is a graduate of The Ontario College of Art and Design,
and holds a Masters of Fine Art from the University of Western Ontario. He has
exhibited widely in Southern Ontario as well as in New York. In the summer of
2014 he took part in an artist residency at The Scottish Sculpture Workshop.
TOPOGRAPHIES
TOPOGRAPHIES
ANGLE-HANG
Machine knit vintage
acrylic yarn
180” x 102”
2014
Machine knit green
wool yarn
14” x 68”
2014
Hand woven acrylic
and wool yarn
19” x 45”
2015
I try to create a dialogue between ambiguity and hybridity. The things
I make and the materials I use often shift between the familiar and the
uncanny. Part minimal sculpture, sometimes figurative, reflective of clothing
and other materials morph into ambiguous objects and installations that
reveal and conceal. Through processes of production involving textiles, my
works are attempts at consolidating concepts of anxiety, humour, clothing,
static objects, spatial play, memory and time.
My studio practice involves the production of machine-knit and hand woven
textiles. I hang, twist, stretch, layer, felt and bind these handmade textiles.
Found, ready-made knit clothing and various other kinds of found textiles
are also used in my work, further exploring a physicality of textiles.
My hand woven works are often wall based and more physically relational,
being handmade, emphasizing materiality, colour and pattern. There are
elements of Bauhaus inspired design and modernist painting integrated
into the hand woven works, combining a history of high art and craft. My
object-based works, which utilize plastic and wood under-structures covered
by machine-knit textiles, shift between figuration and abstraction. In some
cases they play with forms of traditional and historic sculpture and craft. I
also forgo internal structures like wood and plastic, allowing the machineknit textiles to display their material properties.
7
ANDREW MCPHAIL
www.andrewmcphail.com
Andrew McPhail is a Canadian artist based in Hamilton, Ontario. His craft
and text based work configures ephemeral materials such as band aids,
Kleenex, disposable gloves and other textile related items into installations
and performance based gestures that seek to describe the fragility, pathos
and humour of our existence, often referencing his experiences as a person
living with HIV.
GHOST
Sequins, thread, coffee, tears on used bed sheet.
104” x 104”
2015
Ghost is a seven by seven foot piece of bed linen, with the
word GHOST hand embroidered in white and clear sequins in
its center. Or more precisely, the negative space around the
word GHOST is embellished with sequins. Alluding to the death
bed and the winding-sheet, and through the sequins’ material
association with fashion and glamour, GHOST seeks to conjure
the tragic atmosphere surrounding the premature deaths of gay
men from AIDS since the 1980’s, as well as the strange twilight
those of us who survive, occupy.
8
ANU RAINA
www.anuraina.com
Anu Raina is a Textile graduate from Sheridan College (2010). Her work is mostly
inspired by her own life journeys. She uses different mediums such as India ink, dyes,
pigments, embroidery, silk screening and digital printing to create her prints. Many of
her artworks are made into Silk scarves and clothing. Her prints have been worn by
many dignitaries and she been featured in several mainstream Canadian publications
such as The Toronto Star, The National Post, The Globe and Mail, Toronto Sun, Elle
Canada, Flare and NOW Magazine. She has also been interviewed by CBC Radio, CTV,
Kevin Newman Live and Breakfast Television in Toronto.
Raina graduated in 2010 from the Crafts and Design program at Sheridan College in
Oakville, Ontario. A valedictorian of her class, she graduated with High Honours, top
medal and several awards and scholarships including a residency at prestigious
Harbourfront Centre in Toronto.
In 2012, Raina was nominated for Ontario Premier’s award for excellence. She has also
collaborated with eBay Canada and The Law Society of Upper Canada to create
collections of high end silk scarves for them.
Currently Anu Raina lives with her husband and two children in Oakville, Ontario.
CHAPTER 2, PAGE 1
Mylar, embroidery punch cards, embroidery threads
50” X 60”
Most of my inspirations come from an innate urge to give an expression to my
thoughts and experiences that came with the journey of my life.
“Chapter 2, Page 1” is a tribute to the memory of my beautiful mother to whom I
had to bid goodbye at the tender age of ten.
It is the first artwork in an autobiographical series of five that I am slowly
working on. In creating this 50” x 60” piece of memory I have worked in many
layers, visual and conceptual, by hand stitching pieces of Mylar and discarded
embroidery punch cards. The artwork is silk screened and painted freehand with
colors, pigments and motifs. The memory of waking up in her arms every morning
is hand embroidered in background in form of a poem in French that I once wrote
about her. The use of paisley motifs is a response to a special memory of going
to the fabric looms with her, where she would buy fine Cashmere shawls as part
of the wedding gifts for me and my sister.
She knew she had very little time.
9
DYLAN FISH
www.dylanfish.net
Dylan Fish is currently pursing his MFA in Fiber and Material Studies at the
School of the Art Institute of Chicago where he is exploring the idea of digital
and physical communities. Comment Thread 0001 is part of a larger series of
work that has been previously exhibited in Halifax and South Africa.
COMMENT THREAD 0001
Jacquard weaving; merino wool, cotton warp
18’ x 123’
2013
Comment Thread 0001 engages the topic of memory, both in
how we use technology today to store, share and shape our
identities through platforms like Facebook, as well as how the
computer itself stores this information in a vast digital memory
that was directly adopted from Joseph Marie Jacquard’s punch
card loom.
10
ELYCIA SFA
www.elyciasfa.com
Elycia SFA is a textile artist / designer / maker. The majority of her work
revolves around themes of personal narratives, combined with memory,
nostalgia, and loss, while portraying these concepts in the form of woven
cloth. Weaving is her primary method of making, combined with woven
inlay and stitching which allows her to draw with thread and create
representational imagery within the body of the cloth.
-44.460711, -63.618275
Handwoven digital print on cotton sateen 5” x 16”
2015
Personal memory is an intriguing phenomenon, which helps us
situate ourselves amongst the people around us. Our memories
form a sense of identity that connects us to the larger world.
This work explores the memories of particular landscapes, along
with the inevitable distortion and decay of memory over time.
11
HARNEET HEER
hkheer.tumblr.com
Harneet Heer is a graduate of the Honours Fine Arts program at the
University of Waterloo. She was born in Rexdale, Ontario to parents of
Punjabi decent. Working primarily in soft sculpture and collage, she is
most interested in exploring identity issues surrounding femininity,
sexuality and race with her artwork.
A SHADOW STITCHED ON I-IV Stitching on photo print 4” X 6”
2015
I stitched the image by using different coloured threads to
highlight different parts of the women in the picture. The
stitching around the shawl emphasizes her cultural and racial
identity. The yellow and white threads are used to highlight her
features and represent the western cultural ideals of beauty
(construction of beauty through European ideals). The images
represent how often coloured women are left out in feminist
thought and how often white women are considered the voice
for all women. We have different struggles and our fight for
equality is not just gender based.
12
HELENE VOSTERS
www.helenevosters.com
An artist, activist and scholar, Helene’s work focuses on the role of public
commemoration practices in constructing narratives related to militarism,
nationalism and violence. In addition to Flag of Tears, Helene has performed the
durational memorial meditations Impact Afghanistan War, Unravel, Haunting the
Past’s Present, and Shot at Dawn throughout Canada, the U.S. and Europe.
FLAG OF TEARS: LAMENT FOR
THE STAINS OF A NATION
Embroidery on flag (a task-based participatory lament)
73” x 35”
2014–ongoing
Inaugurated in 1965, Canada’s distinctive (and distinctively friendly) Maple
Leaf replaced the British Union Jack, symbolizing the birth of a new nation
unstained by its colonial past. Under the reign of the Canadian Maple Leaf, a
documented 1200 Aboriginal women and girls have been murdered or gone
missing. For decades these murders were met with denial and indifference
on the part of authorities and the general public. Today, as the result of the
sustained labour of Aboriginal community activists, artists and scholars, the
issue of Canada’s murdered and missing Aboriginal women and girls has been
brought to the arena of public discourse and conscience. But despite growing
national and international pressure, Prime Minister Harper steadfastly refuses
to call for an inquiry. Flag of Tears takes its name from the Highway of Tears
— an 800 kilometer stretch of Highway in Northern British Columbia where
an estimated forty (mostly Aboriginal) women and girls have gone missing or
been found murdered.
Part mourning ritual, and part meditation on the stains of the Canadian nation,
Flag of Tears’ embroidery circles invite participants into a conscious reflection
on the consequences of our forgetful narratives of Canadian nationalism
through the task-based engagement with remembrance. As an act of lament
and collective reckoning participants gather and sew tears — embroidering
the stains of the nation onto the flag.
13
JAMIE ASHFORTH
www.jamieashforth.com
Jamie Ashforth holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts from Concordia University,
Montréal, Québec. She has exhibited in a number of group and solo
exhibitions in Central and Eastern Canada. Jamie uses many mediums
and has a current inclination towards painting, printmaking and textiles.
Her work explores memory and expresses longing. She draws on the
inevitability of improvisation.
GHOSTS
UNKNOWN I
JAMIE
Found rucksack, wooden stretcher
42” X 60”
2007
Trousers, wood stretcher
36” X 60”
2007
SUSAN
UNKNOWN II
Poncho, wood stretcher
38” X 60”
2007
Camping pack, wooden stretcher
12” X 24”
2007
GHOSTS is a gathering of evidence; a collection of disassembled
and recontextualized found objects. Deconstructing these utilitarian
objects exposes subtleties like stains, fading, smudges and tears
— unintended marks that organically build composition and depth
and embody memory. Each piece tells a story like a time-capsuled
moment or a ghostly impression.
14
JEN HAMILTON
www.jenhamilton.ca
Jen Hamilton is a painter and printmaker based in London, Ontario. She
received her BFA from NSCAD University as well as her Fine Art Advanced
Diploma from Fanshawe College. She has exhibited professionally in cities
across Canada and her work can be found in both private and public
collections.
Inconsistently Fixed
OLIVER
3PM
Acrylic, Lace on Canvas
72” x 32”
2012
Acrylic, Lace on Canvas
54” x 54”
2012
To represent the distortion of memory over time, these paintings
show falsely constructed scenes inspired from family photographs.
Pattern and textiles distort these paintings while bidding to remain
familiar. The use of lace distorts and the process of creation is as
unstable as the false memory it represents.
15
JENNY ISERMAN
sevengablehouseart.blogspot.com
I am largely self-taught, combining a career in social services with quilt
making, book art, printmaking and mixed media. My day job sensitized me
to the wrongs of our world. My work reflects my conviction that one
purpose of art is to bear witness and hope for change. This piece was
originally juried into “Outside/Inside” at 2012 FiberPhiladelphia. It is one
of my series of quilts and artist’s books exhibited in 2014 at the Durham
(Ontario) Art Gallery.
COMFORT/DISCOMFORT (BLOOD & ROSES)
Commercial and re-purposed fabrics, silk, metallic and upholstery threads,
seed beads. Appliqued, machine and hand stitched, hand beaded.
75” x 58.5”
2011–2012
Traditional quilts symbolize warmth, reassurance and happy
memories. This is an ambiguous, subversive piece that
memorializes victims of domestic homicide. It looks like a
traditional “crazy quilt” but its beauty and weight belie any
promised comfort. Instead it forces us to confront unpleasant
realities, ensuring memory is kept alive.
16
JOYCE MELANDER-DAYTON
Joyce Melander-Dayton lives and works in Santa Fe, New Mexico. A
graduate of Carleton College and the University of Minnesota, she has
exhibited internationally and her work is held in many private and public
collections.
THEME & VARIATIONS
Gatorboard, silk, wool, cotton, glass beads
70” x 44” x 7”
2009
Memory is ephemeral. It is malleable and elusive. It changes to accommodate
our present. It is a story that we tell ourselves to give us meaning. It is a gift.
I started Theme and Variations on my 25th wedding anniversary trip to
Scandinavia. It was a joyful time. My husband and I had beaten the odds:
after 25 years we were still married and in love. We were looking to many
more years together. I remember working on this piece while sitting in the
lounge on a mail boat traveling north up the Norwegian coast.
Seven years have passed and my husband and I are getting a divorce.
What was once unthinkable is now my reality. Yet, I am unburdened: I
have the memory of making Theme and Variations and while I grieve my
loss, I realize I have a new beginning.
The beauty of working with needle and thread is that it ties one to the
present. Every stitch is a singular record of the moment lived. One’s
senses are heightened, one is available to experience the “now” more
fully. My marriage may be ending, but my memory of our best times
has been made possible by the fact that I could slow down enough to
appreciate them. I look at Theme and Variations and am grateful for the
memories it brings me.
17
JUDITH E MARTIN
www.judithmartin.info
Judy Martin was born in 1951 and grew up on a large property near the
northwestern Ontario town of Fort Frances. All her life Martin has studied
art and in June 2012, she graduated with first class honours in the second
fine art degree she has acquired through distance education.
Time Is A Material
RED MOONS
Reclaimed wool blanket, wool threads
Hand stitch
20.5” x 142”
2014
Red Moons is made from a re-constructed hundred-year old
wool blanket. That this cloth holds time and memory is evident in
the several threadbare areas. These worn places evoke the man,
woman, or child who lay with the blanket and repeatedly pulled
it up as a covering. I have darned some of the more worn areas
and strengthened the edges with blanket-stitched red wool. This
recent handwork adds another layer of human touch.
18
LESLIE PUTNAM
www.leslieputnam.com
Leslie Putnam earned her BFA from Concordia University in Québec,
with a major in Studio Art, and BEd from Western University in Ontario.
Putnam’s CV includes exhibitions in France, Portugal and Luxembourg,
where she lived and worked from her studio at the publicly supported
Schleiffmillen. In Ontario, she works as both a visual arts educator and
artist. Her multidisciplinary practice ranges from explorations using
sound within sculptural pieces, public art work, and miniature to large
installation works made from natural materials. In 2011, she and her
partner David Bobier were awarded the public art call for the Tolpuddle
Martyr’s Monument, in London, Ontario. In 2010 she and David Bobier
formed the o’honey collective.
I KEEP TRYING TO TELL YOU
Installation – fibre/sound piece
Felted wool, beeswax, spices, audio component
2014–ongoing
As city dwellers, the natural world calls to us from memory,
both inherent and experienced. I keep trying to tell you exists
to remind us of this.
19
LHEILA PALUMBO
Originally from Toronto, Lheila Palumbo is a textile artist and designer living
in Montréal. Before entering the field of textiles, she spent several years
studying architecture and French literature. She currently teaches courses
in advanced weaving, Jacquard weaving, and digital embroidery at the
Montréal Centre for Contemporary Textiles.
FRAGMENTED 1
FRAGMENTED 2
Hand woven with cotton
yarn and wood on a digital
jacquard loom
36” x 30”
2015
Hand woven with cotton yarn and
wood on a digital jacquard loom
48” x 46”
2015
Mandelbrot’s mapping of fractals and their visual appeal, as well
as museum artefacts documenting ancient sea and land travel,
were my incongruous yet strangely linked starting points.
Using structural patterns created from a set number of variables,
I wanted to weave imagery that would depict pattern and
variation, while suggesting fragmented memories of places
travelled or imagined.
20
LIBS ELLIOTT + JOSHUA DAVIS
www.libselliott.com / www.joshuadavis.com
Elizabeth (Libs) Elliott is a textile artist and designer based in Toronto,
Canada. Since 2012, she has been exploring the intersection of technology
and traditional craft by using generative design to build handmade quilts.
A deep appreciation for craftsmanship, design history and future-focused
applications are all reflected in her work. Her commissions include work for
individuals and corporate clients such as Playground Inc. She has exhibited
her projects and done speaking engagements internationally, and has been
covered by press such as Gizmodo.com and The Creators Project.
Since 1995, Joshua Davis, an American designer, technologist, author and artist
in new media, has made a career as an image-maker using programming. He
writes his own code to produce interactions with users and to generate visual
compositions according to rule-based, randomized processes. His work has
been inducted into the Smithsonian’s Cooper Hewitt Design Museum National
Design Triennial 2006 ‘Design Life Now’, and has work in the permanent
collection of the Whitney Museum of American Art.
TRIANGLESEX v1.0
Cotton
67” x 67”
2012
TriangleSex v1.0 is the first quilt in history that was designed
using a computer language called Processing. This quilt is a
permanent physical record of a unique digital iteration that was
randomly generated by code and a historic moment that can
never be repeated. Its presence conveys a balance between
computer memory and a moment in time created by hand.
21
LISE MELHORN-BOE
www.lisemelhornboe.ca
Lise Melhorn-Boe has been making funny, feminist artist’s books for almost
forty years, using a light-hearted visual aesthetic to address personal and
political issues affecting women’s and children’s lives and the environment.
Her books are often sculptural — the visual object tells a story of its own.
The RE Books
HAPPY MEMORIES
POST SHOCK TREATMENT
Fabric book
17” X 11” X 6” (closed),
5’ X 27” (hanging)
2015
Fabric book
16” X 10” X 4” (closed),
5.5’ X 2’ (hanging)
2015
RE used as a prefix has many meanings. It can indicate doing
something again, sometimes with the implication of doing it
better, or in a different manner, or, it can mean turning around
or back. Playing off the dictum, “Reduce, Reuse, Recycle,” these
three-word books, made mostly from used fabrics or remnants,
are short stories on the themes of memory and memory loss.
22
LUKUS TOANE
luketoane.tumblr.com
Lukus Toane has lived in Toronto for two years and currently works as the
Gladstone Hotel’s Exhibitions Coordinator. He has previously travelled and
worked in art gallery facilitation in places such as Wrocław, Poland and
Sydney, Australia. Having roots in Northern Alberta, Toane received his
education from Alberta College of Art & Design (ACAD) majoring in painting
with emphasis on portraiture. He continues to explore the idea of art as
object and its relativity to the people who live around it.
RELATIVELY
Wood frame and stretched raw canvas with
individually picked threads
20” x 72-65”ea
The body of work is about presence/absence, analysis of the
art object as it is relative to a subjective viewer. I convey these
motifs by picking individual threads from the weft out of factory
grade raw canvas to reveal the warp. Reminiscent of the general
size of an adult human, the work considers the idea of a universal
portrait. Minimalist but tedious labour is reflective of a love of
labour; repetitive tactility and ‘un-making’ as meditation.
23
MARY KROETSCH
www.mary-kroetsch-textile-mixedmedia-artist.com
Self-taught, I have attended classes at New Brunswick Arts and Crafts
College, George Brown College and the Stratford Festival of the Arts. I have
obtained Certification in Textile Surface Design from the Haliburton School
of the Arts.
My works are in private and public collections including St. Michael’s Hospital
in Toronto, Ontario, the Ilkley Museum in Yorkshire, England and the CAMAC
Centre for Art and Technology in France.
PILL BOX HATS
Soft sculpture comprising photography, printmaking, embroidery, millinery
8” x 8” x 5” ea
This installation uses the crowns of slightly oversized pill box
hats to remember ladies in the varying styles of hats found in
vintage photographs circa 1940. My hybrid art includes digitally
enhanced photographs, printed on fabric with archival inks and
hand embroidered with a free-style straight stitch, to give my
subjects a new, contemporary soul. And these souls need a place
to be seen, so sometimes I look to historical fashion trends to
find an appropriate substrate to frame my textile portraiture.
24
MICHELLE FORSYTH
www.michelleforsyth.com
Toronto-based artist and OCAD professor Michelle Forsyth holds an MFA
from Rutgers University and a BFA from the University of Victoria. She has
had exhibitions in New York, Lisbon, Philadelphia, and Las Vegas in addition
to Toronto. She has received grants from the Canada Council for the Arts,
and Artist Trust.
Footnotes
YELLOW ON YELLOW
(VERSION 2)
GREY AND RED STACK 1
(VERSION 1)
Photographic print on canvas with
gouache and fabric tape
30” x 30”
2015
Photographic print on canvas with
gouache and fabric tape
30” x 30”
2015
BRIGHT STACK WITH PINK (VERSION 1)
Photographic print on canvas with
gouache and fabric tape
30” x 30”
2014
This work includes hand-painted and digitally altered photographs
of carefully arranged objects including: paintings built as horizontal
pedestals, hand-woven copies of my husband’s shirts, crumpled
paper painted to resemble cloth, dresses from my closet, and handpainted backdrops. They are accompanied by footnotes outlining
the personal significance of each item depicted.
25
NICKOLAS LASCOT
www.nicklascot.com
Originally from Denver, Colorado, Nick Lascot has been teaching and
creating art in Toronto since he arrived from Brooklyn in 2011. Nick received
a BFA from The School of Visual Arts and an MFA from Hunter College, and
has participated in numerous exhibitions throughout New York City.
DOPPELGÄNGER
CAST YOUR PEARLS
Fabric, cardboard, paper, starch,
black sealant, armature
36” x 19” x 36”
2015
Fabric, starch, black sealant, armature
22” x 26” x 28”
2014
GIFT HORSE
cardboard, paper, starch, black sealant, armature
21” x 24” x 25”
2014
Working primarily with fabric, paper, and cardboard, I develop
processes that exploit the affordances and limitations of media
to create objects that explore themes of the absurd, grotesque,
and uncanny. These objects press against the sticky, black film
that coats our memories, grimacing through their restraints,
seeking a connection.
26
PAULA JOHN
www.paulajohn.ca
Paula John is a multi-disciplinary artist and scholar based in Toronto. She has
been exhibiting her work (including photography, film, painting, printmaking,
textiles, installation, and performance) since 2003. She holds a Bachelor of Fine
Arts degree in Photography and a Master of Fine Arts degree in Documentary
Media from Ryerson University, and a Master of Arts degree in Communication
and Culture from York University. Some of the themes explored in her work
include, gender, sexuality, feminism, and performance. Paula is currently working
towards a Ph.D. in Theatre and Performance Studies at York University.
I DON’T KNOW WHY THIS HAPPENED, BUT IT DID.
Hand-stitched quilt, silkscreen on cotton, flannel, embroidery,
plastic quilted letters, pill capsules
46” x 50”
2011
I DON’T KNOW WHY THIS HAPPENED, BUT IT DID. is an autobiographical
project exploring the experience of mental illness. It deals with a period of
my life that began when, at age fifteen, I suffered a major mental breakdown
and was subsequently diagnosed with severe clinical depression.
The piece is a handmade quilt, pieced together from silk-screened
documents from my psychiatric file. Quilts are distinctly feminine art forms
that are a part of a long history of women’s artistic expression. A quilt is
also something comforting that you wrap around yourself to keep warm,
and for me the evidence contained in my medical records is validating and
comforting. They are a record in black and white, the primary documents
of what I went through that say, “this happened”. The goal of this work is to
translate a devastating experience into a cathartic one through the process
of art making; to make sense of what happened to me, and ultimately come
to peace with it. In a larger sense, the goal of this piece is to contribute
to the discourse surrounding mental illness and to transform my own life
experience into an aesthetic experience for the viewer.
27
REBECCA SIEMERING
www.rebeccasiemering.com
Rebecca Siemering was born in Omaha, Nebraska in 1974, and lives and works in
Pawtucket, Rhode Island, and is a fiber artist, arts administrator and curator. For
the majority of her career, she has explored the theme of “wanting the good life,”
utilizing found materials. Currently she is producing sculptures and textile art for
her “Lottery Project” by taking a daily walk in the neighbourhood and picking up
thrown away scratch tickets. From her findings she creates animistic textile pieces
and tapestries. Her methodical, yet compulsive style of stitch and needlework
reflects the original obsession — to rise above the mundane, the sculpture
embodying a soul that exists apart from the corporeal article of ink and pulp.
Re(find) Clothing
ICARUS
MIDAS TOUCH
Found lottery tickets, dental
floss, cotton
5’ x 5’ x 1”
2013
Found lottery tickets, Powerball
tickets, dental floss, cotton gold lamé,
Hungarian glass beads
3.5’ x 15” x 15”
2012
RAINMAKER
Found lottery tickets and Pocket Slot tickets, dental
floss, betting sheets, wooden handle
15” x 18” x 4”
2015
I have always loved paper, and started to find scratch tickets on a daily
walk home from work. I began to think about the dreams in the moment
of scratching the image away, the hopes, the desires. It made a hopeful
noise. How sad it must have been to lose. Chuck it. Onto regular life again.
I thought, let’s make something better with this mound of paper, shake
all of the bad luck away. The work reflects creating an armor of dreamlike
better world, and trying to rise above it. I would like to collect Canadian
lottery tickets if possible.
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ROB SHOSTAK
rodasho.com
Rob Shostak is a Toronto-based designer whose practice crosses many disciplines.
From high rise buildings, to product design, graphic work and cartography, the
cross-pollination between each project creates new problem solving strategies
and ideas. Born in Montréal, he has also lived in Vancouver and Los Angeles. Rob
has travelled extensively, but is most proud of having visited every province in
Canada by car over the course of three months. In the summer he rides a bike with
a planter on the back [#O2Wheels]. On Sundays during the winter you can find
him curling.
HOMESPUN YARN: HAMPSTEAD
Sheep’s wool yarn, oak
48” x 84”, 16” x 27” (separate), 80” x 84” (together)
1:2000 scale
2015
Homespun Yarn: Hampstead consists of a mapping of my childhood neighbourhood
in Montréal created using a woven network of yarn. Much of my childhood was
spent in multiple homes with my tightly knit and large extended family. The piece
explores the central presence and influence my parents, grandparents, and
extended family had on my nascent identity. The delicate street/string lattice
serves as the only hint to orientation and place. As a child, these traces would
be incomprehensible. Now, however, these spatial memories are tainted by the
primacy of cartography in our everyday lives.
Since my leaving Montréal, two of the homes have been sold, as my grandparents
have all passed away. The location of their homes are signified by a fraying in the
weaving, recalling the traditional Jewish practice of tearing a garment during the
mourning period. Other significant homes are indicated as they remain a part of the
generational cycle of our broader family unit as my nieces, nephews and secondcousins create their own memories.
The smaller piece is the area around the cemetery where three of my grandparents
are buried. It is a Jewish custom to leave a stone as a marker of one’s visit to a grave:
their eternal home.
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SAM PEDICELLI
www.sampedicelli.com
A Toronto-based artist working in contemporary painting and beadwork.
Primarily concerned with the evolution of modern communication and the
forms through which it occurs, Sam utilizes traditional modes of fine art
and craft in a meticulous consideration of the post-human condition. Sam
Pedicelli currently resides in Toronto and is working towards finishing her
undergraduate thesis at OCAD University.
Digital Natives
COMPENSATION 1:
DIGITALDONKEY
COMPENSATION 1:
BETAFISH
Acrylic paint and beads on
linen // inkjet print
8.5” X 11” ea (diptych)
Acrylic paint and beads on
fabric // inkjet print
6” X 8” ea (triptych)
CHILDRENS’ DRAWING
Acrylic paint and beads on canvas
11” X 17”
Digitization is a natural progression for citizens of contemporary
culture, the technological age giving life to the first generation of
cyber-natives. These works closely examine the idea of memory
and childhood in modern society, drawing specifically upon
first-hand experience of growing up among the latest household
technologies. These images derive their composition and colour
scheme from the imagery of my own childhood drawings.
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THE AR T I S TS HAV E CH E C K E D IN .
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