Process and Material
Process and materials are extremely important elements in my artwork. My practice is textile based and rooted in labor. I believe that labor endows deep meaning. I use stitch resist shibori and indigo dye as a method of drawing. I grow and extract my own indigo dye. Each drawing is a collaboration between the earth, water, and air as the indigo is grown in earth, submerged in water, and exposed to air to complete the bonding process. The image is made through the chemical bond of oxygen to leucoindigo. When the fabric emerges from the vat the chemical bond completes – creating the image on the surface. The drawing is contained in a moment. It is a happening.
What is Indigo?
Indigo is a pigment in a variety of plants found all over the world. There are many different types of plants that have indigo content. These plants are not genetically related - but all contain indican which through a chemical process can become indigo dye. The most common varieties are Indigofera tinctoria (often called "true indigo"), Polygonum tinctoria (Japanese indigo), Indigofera suffruticosa (Guatemalan indigo), Persicaria tinctoria (Chinese indigo), and Isatis tinctoria (woad).
I grow a small patch of Japanese indigo in Syracuse New York, where it grows as an annual.
What is Shibori?
Shibori is a Japanese word that means “to wring, press, or squeeze.” It is essentially a method of fabric preparation using folding, stitching, tying, and clamping to create resistance to dye when the fabric is immersed in a vat.
I primarily use different methods of stitch resist shibori which involves hand stitching threads through a base fabric, pulling in the threads, and tying them off. Once the piece is dyed the threads are removed to reveal the drawing.
This process on a large scale is very laborious- sometimes taking many months to a year's worth of hand work to finish an artwork. During this time of creation I am able to be contemplative. I slow down. I require a lot of time to think.
