Thursday 30 December 2010

Problem child #1

© Karen Thiessen 2008 Shadow: Transformation IV
In my studio practice, I regularly encounter duds, disasters, and problem children. Yes, these are the textiles and collages that take months, and sometimes years, to resolve. Shadow: Transformation IV began as two unresolved textiles. The base textile was originally vertically-oriented with a long tail hanging down and hung unresolved on my studio wall for over a year. I had been hand and machine stitching the "top" textile for several years. Two things happened to move this piece along: the "collage thinking" from my collage classes finally sunk in and after teaching a texture workshop one weekend my thinking changed direction. The moment that I walked into my studio that weekend I saw the two duds in a new light. I was bold and chopped the tail off the base textile and then oriented it horizontally. Then I brazenly hacked up the top textile and attached it to the base textile. Voila! After three years of being in limbo, two became one. Shadow: Transformation IV represented Canada in the Cheongju International Craft Biennale 2009. Do you know how much courage it takes to chop up a textile that has taken several years of work?

1 comment:

Judy Martin said...

Thanks for reminding me about this piece and giving some background re the construction of it. Gorgeous. xo