Silk screen, letterpress, and blowouts on handmade abaca and cotton paper (2017) 10” x 11”
This book explores the concept of an invisible mend, contrasting the mend of a garment with the attempt to mend a relationship.
A darning stitch is a sewing technique used for repairing worn areas in fabric, an attempt to make the repair as neat and invisible as possible to restore a piece of clothing to its original state. Instructions and diagrams for darning are printed on overbeaten abaca paper, while on cotton paper are images of fabric alongside a narrative of a marriage. The cotton spreads are visible beneath the translucent abaca sheets, juxtaposing this story against the clear and straightforward instructions for mending clothing.
The images of torn cloth are created using the blowout technique, further emphasizing the moments of damage and wear both within the fabric and within the relationship.
Published by Women's Studio workshop. This book was made possible through an artist residency and the Artist's Book Grant from WSW, in addition to a Project Assistance Grant from College Book Arts Association. The book is 44 pages and the edition size is 47.
WSW blog post about the creation of this book.
Detail. Example of a blowout with silk screen printing.
Detail of letterpress and overlap of the translucent abaca over the cotton paper.
Detail.
Letterpress printing, blind embossing, and collographs on waxed handmade paper and cotton blowouts on abaca.
The inspiration for this book comes from considering the way clothing imposes and impresses itself on the body. The pages alternate between cotton blowouts of lace patterns on translucent abaca and flesh toned sheets of paper embossed with the same pattern. Throughout the book, although the garment begins to deteriorate, the flesh below continues to carry the mark of the fabric; even once the lace is gone completely. The progression of the book mimics the way remnants of our experiences exist with us in the present, despite the moment being over and gone. The text explores how an experience can mark you and make it difficult to move forward without the expectation that history will repeat itself.
This book was created while in residence at the Minnesota Center for Book Arts during the late summer of 2015. It was bound in 2016.
Sample spread.
The recto is dyed cotton paper and the verso is a lace cotton blowout on translucent abaca. Both handmade paper.
Blind embossing of lace collograph.
Sample spread.
Detail.
Sample spread.
Consists of two books: a 6” x 4” accordion and a 4” x 6” drum leaf simple case bound book. The text was printed on a Vandercook SP-20 using type handset in 10 pt. Baskerville on handmade paper. The imagery was created using pulp painting, blowout techniques, and screen printing.
A darning stitch is used to create an invisible mend on clothing. Using ambiguous directions (based on darning instructions) as text, this work explores the idea of mending in relation to emotional ruptures and how to recover when the damage is too great.
Detail of Accordion. Handmade paper, pulp painting, screen printing, and letterpress.
Detail of drumleaf. Handmade paper, blowouts, and letterpress printing.
Offset Lithography, printed in the Borowsky Center for Publication Arts at the University of the Arts, Philadelphia, PA (2014).
As Peter Stallybrass writes in his article Worn Worlds, clothing "receives us: receives our smells, our sweat, our shape even [...] holding our gestures." In contemplating the tattered clothing I have held onto over time, its functionality long gone, I consider the way clothing retains memory but also a ghostlike presence.
Detail spread.
Detail spread.
Detail spread.
5 pieces total
Cyanotype on cotton with screen print and stitched handmade paper. Stretched over wood frame.
17” x 22” each
Cyanotype, screenprint, and blind embossed letterpress printing. 11” x 17”
Layered prints, screenprint on overbeaten handmade abaca paper. 21” x 28”
In this work I explore the historical use of women as vehicles for the exchange of property and wealth between men through marriage dowries. It was part of an exhibition at the Lauren Rodgers Museum (in Laurel, MS) titled Collections Interventions. Artists were invited to choose a work from the permanent collection as inspiration for making a new piece. I chose a candelabra from the British Georgian Silver Collection because of its material tie to bridal gifts and affluence. Using design features from the candelabra, I built a female figure out of lace which is printed on separate sheets of translucent handmade paper. These sheets overlap one another to evoke the sense that the figures (i.e. objects) are inconsequential and interchangeable.
This piece was purchased by the museum and is now a part of the LRM permanent collection.
Pulp painting and watermarks on handmade paper (cotton and abaca). Each panel is 11” x 17, full piece is 24” x 35” when framed.
I wanted to create an image that would change depending on how it was held, engaging with light and translucency. In past handmade paper projects I have focused on using the blowout method, however, for this piece I chose to create the bodice as a watermark in order to achieve a “reverse blowout.” In doing this, the gauzy cotton overlay of the corset watermark evokes the sheer quality of lace enhancing the materiality of the piece. It allows the pulp painting on the back to show through and lures a reader to flip the print. I am frequently thinking about surface and tactility, which is why I used two different fibers to further the conflict between lure and snare.
Editioning handmade paper is always a process of troubleshooting, in this case figuring out how to order different layers of the print so as to laminate the two sheets together. I pulled the cotton sheet without a deckle to enhance the translucency of the watermark and because the design was so precarious I couched on top of the abaca sheet (taking advantage of its gelatinous surface to get the corset to stick). Embedding the pulp painting between the sheets entraps the lace drawing at the center and enhances the visibility of the design in the foreground.
Handmade paper with cotton blowouts on overbeaten abaca with screenprints. Series of 6 prints, all 16” x 20.“
This series considers how women must alter themselves during the process of marriage in order to fit into the expectations of a Wife. The lace garments in the foreground represent bridal clothes, the preparations for the upcoming wedding day. While the sewing patterns in the background act as a foundation for the garments, the expectations and designs a bride is expected to conform to in order to become a good wife.
Alterations (Collar)
Alterations (Corset)
Alterations (Bodice)
Alterations (Lingerie)
Alterations (Garter)
Alterations (Stockings)
Installation View. Each print is 7.5” x 22”
9 two color etchings on Hahnemühle paper with hand sewing on handmade overbeaten abaca paper.
Detail of sewing on handmade abaca paper.
Detail of etching on Hahnemühle paper.
Detail of sewing on handmade abaca paper.
Detail of etching on Hahnemühle paper.
Monotypes on Arches 88, 11” x 14”
This series of prints explore the potential of clothing as a signifier for skin. Shirts, sweatpants, and jackets allow us to re-experience past moments or sensations: the embrace of a parent, the comfort of a friend, the caress of a lover. Throughout this series I examine the wear and tear on my garments, suggesting the absence of the person to whom the clothing was connected.
The titles of each print function as a narrative.
Dip dye and screenprinting on voiles, chiffon, charmeuse, and cotton. Fabric panels are 9ft tall and vary between 60 and 86 inches wide. (2021)
Through my research I fixated on the etymology of the word lace:
LACE––early 13c. from Old French laz "a net, noose, string, cord, or snare,” from Vulgar Latin *lacium, a trapping and hunting term, probably from Italic base *laq- "to ensnare" (compare Latin lacere "to entice”).
I am interested in the way delicate fabrics such as lace have considerable strength to stretch and tug, enclosing the body in both comforting and discomforting ways. In the definition the relationship between the words entice and ensnare mimics the insidious aspects of performing femininity (and expectations that come with it). An inner conflict between yearning to be a delicate object of beauty and desire, while simultaneously wishing to not be objectified by or evaluated on those qualities.
The installation explores lace as a material that both seduces and entraps, luring bodies to wear it while simultaneously trapping those bodies in a patterned snare. I hope viewers are enticed by the sensory qualities of the piece, creating a spacial and tactile experience of being coaxed into a trap unawares.
Video walkthrough of the exhibition in the Hall Gallery at Millsaps College.
Artist Talk of the exhibition.
Crochet yarn embedded in handmade paper , woven with roving and yarn.
Individual weaving
Detail
Trench is the result of a class taught by Maine-based fibers artist Warren Seelig, with experimentation and discovery as the only method of working towards a concept. He describes materiality as “a behavior and a need we have as artists and human beings to connect with the physical and sensual world [...] a phenomenon which is best understood through the experience of doing."
Without an outline or sketch, Trench became a three-dimensional representation of the montypes in my Worn series, simply through making.
Detail
MFA Thesis Exhibition Installation View
Rosenwald-Wolf Gallery
The University of the Arts
This body of work investigates emotional pain, touching on broader themes of absence, loss, and nostalgia. Through papermaking, printmaking, and bookmaking I explore how the past permanently marks us and the way in which every day losses, both small and large, accumulate over time. Considering different forms of damage and repair, I highlight the futility in attempting to conceal the past. Drawing from both a conceptual and process–oriented practice, my studio investigations focus on developing a visual language with which to address this pain and explore the markings of daily experience.
Handmade paper, translucent Yupo, letterpress; 15 boxes each 8" x 6" x 0.75"
This work consists of fifteen objects resembling books, but instead of pages on the inside they contain an inset box, which holds a piece of handmade paper. In this work the paper within the inset acts as a signifier for the body, a fragment standing in for the whole, suggesting the accumulation and storage of past experiences of pain. The inset box is often used in book conservation and in Trove each one is labeled with a date and age. The objects become a collection of reliquaries, holding a metaphorical piece of the body.
Detail
Monotypes on waxed Hosho and Mulberry papers; 24.5” x 17.25”
Monotypes pulled on a Vandercook SP-20. They are created by dropping mineral spirits onto a plexiglass base and allowing the chemicals to break through the ink. The mineral spirits form fluid marks, creating openings that resemble tears or wounds. I fill in the openings with a deeper tones and darker colors to reference scabbing and by waxing the paper I give the print a flesh-like quality. The white gallery wall becomes an examination space, the stark white referencing a clinical environment. Each corner is pulled taut with a T-Pin, alluding to dissection and analysis. These images become specimens on the wall laid out raw for the viewers to inspect.
Select Prints
Installation View of Raw and Whitewash it Away II
Offset printing, pressure printing, and screen printing; 11.75” x 17.25”
Offset lithography prints of a monotype illustrating a tear in clothing with a pressure print over the surface. Throughout the stack of 100 prints, the initial image is slowly covered by a silkscreen of white lace. This piece is an exploration of our obsessive and ultimately future attempts to conceal the past. It is fully realized by the way in which the oil based ink used in offset printing literally bleeds through the layers of white acrylic screen printing ink. This interaction is the residue of process and instead of concealing the mark serves to indicate what is below.
Select prints from Whitewash it Away II, showing the accumulation of screen printing.
During its exhibition I invited visitors to take a print from the stack. As they each removed a print, the tear/wound below becomes more visible and slowly exposed. This mimics the way in which we reveal our past to one another and how we empathize with each other by taking part in a shared experience.
Monotype on waxed Hosho and Mulberry papers; 24.5” x 17.25”
Palliate: (verb) make less severe without removing the cause; disguise the severity or gravity of.
This piece considers the way in which we recover from damage through an investigation of materials and process.
Installation view of Palliate and Through and Through
Waxed handmade paper and sewing thread; 10.75” x 8.5” x 0.5”
The handmade paper is dyed a deep red in order to reference the interior body. Throughout the stack, the pages are perforated with varying force and depth, visually evoking the experience of damage and deterioration. The book begins with very shallow marks that are hardly visible, but as the book progresses the perforations become more noticeable and the waxed paper more vulnerable to breakage. Towards the end of the book I introduce thread as a mending element that holds the page together or as an attempt to fill in holes within the sheet. Sometimes it creates a surface that is just as strong if not stronger than before, while serving as a futile repair in others.
Select spreads
Set of nesting conservation enclosures.
