The artists in Unraveled: Textiles Reconsideredreinvent the everyday and make it resonate. Magazines, clothing, rugs, bed sheets, blankets and even popular phrases are taken apart and then rebuilt into something entirely new. The reconstruction thereby entails processes associated with textiles such as cutting then sewing, folding then stacking, unraveling then reforming, or printing on, embroidering or weaving fabric. As a case in point, Icelandic artist Hildur Bjarnadottir unravels her recently deceased grandmother’s trousers and then rolls them into a single ball of thread to create a poetic memorial. Mexican-American artist Adrian Esparza unwinds cheap, acrylic Mexican blankets to single threads from which he creates hard-edged abstract wall drawings. Ying Kit Chan constructs abstractions of Chinese characters created from cut and torn bed sheets masked in black gesso. The exhibition also features the work of Noel Anderson, Lisa Anne Auerbach, Margarita Cabrera, Mark R. Smith, Kari Steihaug and Marie Watt, who collectively return materiality, labor and touch to the production of politics.

Margarita Cabrera, Saguaro from series Space in Between, 2010. Image courtesy the Artist.

Artists

Noel Anderson, Lisa Anne Auerbach, Hildur Bjarnadóttir, Margarita Cabrera, Margarita Cabrera, Margarita Cabrera collaboration with Teresa Sanchez, Adrian Esparza, Ying Kit Chan, Mark R. Smith, Kari Steihaug, Marie Watt

Curated by

Kate Bonansinga

Sponsored by

PNC