antique textiles
cyanotype: stains & prints
hand-dyed discards
The Dodo
from the Extinction(s) Series
Created between Nov. 6 and Nov. 15, 2024
Medium
Cut Relief: used fiber, paint, thread, adhesive, canvas, cotton US flag
60”h x 50”w
Process information:
Cut Relief
The project will depict organisms in fiber and textile, in a format I consider a hybrid of the late 1970’s fad of Cut and Sew homemade stuffed-animals/pillows (from pre-printed fabric), relief sculpture and topographical maps. I’m calling this method Cut Relief.
Layers of recycled fabric are built up into form with the final top layers created with dyed cotton canvas or reclaimed materials. The relief aspect of the layered fabric relies on contour lines delineating sections either built up or cut away into the textiles, like a topographic map. The quantitative representation of elevation normally attributed to three-dimensional geography, or in the case of a biological organism, will not always represent this information accurately as found in nature. As sections will be built up some in some locations and recede back in others, height and depth will be played with arbitrarily.
My working name will be amended to “Auntie Gin”, pronounced antigen, which reflects not only the auto-immune diseases I am dealing with in life, but also the artists role of socio-political agitator with a heavy reliance on scientific, historic and environmental research.
Extinction(s) is the first planned project created using this technique and will explore some extinct flora and fauna from a variety of past extinction events in prehistory, including those caused and by man.
About THE DODO
My dodo is a composite conception based upon art based upon art, accompanied by my contemporary research.
I referred to the few drawings catalogued from the Dutch East India Company sailors. A Dutch fleet had taken possession of the island of Mauritius in 1598 in an attempt at harvesting local ebony wood while planting sugar cane for crop production that had been brought from Java.
The earliest drawing of a dodo comes from their time there in about 1601. By the time their ships had abandoned the island in 1710, the dodo was extinct (it was last documented alive in 1688). As well as the birds having to reckon with deforestation and with on-board vermin that exited the ships while at anchor, they were simply seen as fresh meat. And although they found the dodo tough and unpalatable, the dodo was eaten into oblivion by the Dutch.
17th century Indian master painter and naturalist Ustad Mansur, who specialized in plants and animals, was the earliest artist to depict the dodo in color in 1628. Research also points to all depictions of dodos based on taxidermy recreations are shown as extremely plump and overfed in captivity, including Mansur’s as it was likely observed in a Moghul royal court’s menagerie.
Cornelius Saftlevin’s sketch of a dodo head is the last known drawing of the bird from life in 1638. The work of Dutch illustrator FW Frohawk informed the feet.
2024
recycled denim, dye, canvas, recycled fabric, waxed cotton thread, adhesive, ghost gear net
60 x 72 x 1 in.
meditation on climate grief. how do things decay when the material is not natural.
we will become the fodder for what comes next.
2024
54h x 32w x 9d
vintage fur coat fragments, vintage shearling fragments, antique mirror, chicken wire, fabric and canvas
Our species is a walking killing jar. Our specialty is anything we admire. But we want others to admire us for the thing that another being possesses. So, we take. We kill. We strip. We walk around dressed in that being’s skin. As if the act behind the possession can be unseen. Uncared about. We don’t take on its beauty. We have just become a walking jar of consumption for whatever catches our eye, without a care in the world.
2024
canvas, thread, the artist’s late father’s clothing, coffee bags, on stretchers
30×64
2024
recycled denim, dye, canvas, recycled fabric, waxed cotton thread, adhesive, ghost gear net
28x20x1
meditation on climate grief. how do things decay when the material is not natural.
we will become the fodder for what comes next.
2024
canvas, thread, the artist’s late father’s clothing, dyed cloth on stretchers
30×64
2020
antique fabric, found wood, enamel, fabric tacks, lead, foam, paint, adhesives
34 x 34 x 12 in.
2020
cyanotype stained and printed cotton, nails, thread, stone, foam
18 x 6 x 6 in.
homage to egyptian mummification with nod to first world problems
2019
cyanotype printed cotton duck, reclaimed nails, shed antlers and mixed media
80 x 10 x 14 in.
Head printed with frontal cyanotype of deer skull, sides printed with two jaw mandibles, body print of wildflowers and grasses. Nails from my late father’s workshop. Depicting the balance of life, death and what is left.