Tag: textiles

Left: Ann Hamilton, still life, 1988

“Tables are my blank paper, my landscape, my figure, a plane that implies the
solitary figure and all that is social … two people sitting face-to-face, working
together, eating or speaking… . All tables inherit a history of their use as a site of
communion and sacrifice.
This work was conceived specifically for the home of a landscape designer, volunteered
for use for the exhibition. still life was situated in the living room, the space
that occupies a central physical and social position within the house. Eucalyptus
leaves sourced from the outside the house were encrusted in paraffin and covered
the room’s walls. An attendant sat in front of a dining table which was engulfed
by a stack of 800 men’s white shirts that were each laundered and folded, then
singed and gilded on the edges. A smaller table, placed against the wall, displayed
empty velvet jewelry forms. The metal fireplace which occupied the opposite end
of the room was removed; its bed of ashes remained as it was replaced by a 20’
live eucalyptus tree. Placed in and near the windowsill, two vaporizers scented
with eucalyptus oil filled the environment with moisture and a medicinal scent,
creating within the living room the feeling of something or someone askew. From
an unseen source, recorded excerpts from Carmen and The Magic Flute played in
the background.”
–Ann Hamilton

Right: Janine Antoni, “Slumber” (1993): “During “Slumber”, Antoni made the gallery her bedroom, where she recorded her brainwave signals of rapid eye movements (REM) on an electroencephalograph (EEG) as she slept. The following morning, she would use strips torn from her nightgown to weave patterns into a blanket corresponding to the resulting pattern on the REM graph. The entire process took place over an 8-day period. In her 2000 rendition of the performance at MASS MoCa, she wore a nightgown made from textiles printed at the mill when it housed Arnold Print Works from the 1860s to the 1940s (MASS MoCA is a renovated factory building from the industrial era). Visitors were allowed access to the gallery during the day when Antoni was weaving, but the museum was closed to the public at night while Antoni did her ‘dream work.’”—-Categorized Art