Art/Sewn: Tradition, Innovation, Expression

Emily Barletta - Sandy Benjamin-Hannibal - Denise Burge -
Elisa D’Arrigo - Linnea Glatt - Janet Henry - Cyrilla Mozenter - Jessica Rankin - Anna Von Mertens

Curated by Ward Mintz

on view: March 26 – May 8, 2011
Opening reception: Saturday, March 26, 4:30–7pm

Nine artists will be featured in the exhibition, all of whom use sewing or embroidery in their work. The artists include Emily Barletta, Sandy Benjamin-Hannibal, Denise Burge, Elisa D’Arrigo, Linnea Glatt, Janet Henry, Cyrilla Mozenter, Jessica Rankin and Anna Von Mertens; the exhibition is guest curated by Ward Mintz, who also consults to a foundation that supports projects in textiles and needle arts.

Since Art/Sewn is the first exhibition at Five Myles to explore art made with sewing, Mintz decided to present art created in a range of styles and approaches, from traditional and conceptual quilts, to felt sculpture held together by thread, to assemblaged “tchotchkes” sewn into clear acrylic. Two of the artists, Linnea Glatt of Dallas and Denise Burge of Cincinnati, are showing in New York for the first time.

Three of the artists in the exhibition make quilts or quilt-like work. One, Sandy Benjamin-Hannibal, falls within the African-American quilt tradition by embracing asymmetry and improvisation. Another, Denise Burge, combines piecing and quilting with crochet and uses cartoon-like imagery to tell the story of “the destructive interaction between ourselves and nature.” The third, Anna Von Mertens, explores exploding energy and ocean currents while placing her abstract works on queen-size platforms that emphasize their utilitarian associations.

Jessica Rankin creates an internal cosmos in a large work of embroidery on organdy that floats, literally and figuratively, off the wall. Janet Henry contains the unruly “tchotchkes” of her fictitious character, Assimilata Lefkowitz, by sewing them—and her—in clear acrylic. Elisa D’Arrigo’s sewn and constructed cloth and paper works are lashed together with expressive force and often bulge off the wall. Cyrilla Mozenter revels in the tension produced by making three-dimensional sculptures out of industrial felt and thread.

Emily Barletta and Linnea Glatt borrow from the traditions of Minimalism and Post-Minimalism and create mesmerizing works that, in their making, seem to substitute the needle for the pencil and paintbrush. Glatt machine sews a grid on a large circular form while Barletta embroiders red yarn on paper in allover patterns.

Ward Mintz provides a historical context for art made with thread, reaching back to the mid-1700s, when women in New England began to create pictures on canvas – classical scenes, bucolic landscapes – with needle and thread. Eventually he reaches the 20th century and critics’ characterization of such works as “merely decorative,” as opposed to art, which involved “crucial decisions …. belong[ing] to inspiration and not to manual skill.” This was challenged, Mintz say, by feminist artists and critics who revealed the art world’s hierarchy of media as an arbitrary construct. Now, forty years after those battles erupted, the artists in Art/Sewn feel free to use sewing as an integral element in their work, often embracing the association with traditional women’s pastimes and relatively unconcerned with the art and craft hierarchy.

DIRECTIONS:

Take 2, 3, or 4 trains to Franklin Avenue. Walk two blocks against the traffic on Franklin. Walk ¾ block to 558 St. Johns Place. FiveMyles is within easy walking distance from the Brooklyn Museum.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS:

FiveMyles is supported by The Greenwall Foundation, New York State Council on the Arts, Public Funds from the New York City Dept. of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council, the Foundation for Contemporary Arts, the Brooklyn Community Foundation and by the Brooklyn Arts Council, JPMorgan/Chase.