Wednesday 16 July 2008

Crochet meets art

Let's continue our visit to the chaincreative sculptural crochet exhibition. Today is the turn of the American artists who exhibited at the Washington DC gallery Eleven Eleven Sculpture Space and the Not the Knitting You Know in 2005. I was so excited when I found this site as it really shows what crochet is capable of. I must admit it's one of my themes that crochet has dimensional potential and these artists really explore that. I'm going to feature two of the artists exhibited, Andrea Uravitch and Kathleen Holmes.

Andrea Uravitch is based in Northern Virginia and uses nature as her inspiration for her multi-media works. Her early work was predominantly crochet but has developed over the years. She says 'Crocheting and working with fiber is still my favorite part of the process.' and I think this grounds the work and makes it an almost living thing. This is particularly evident when the sculpture is placed in an environment as in her 1995 work 'Moth Sampler'.

The second artist, Kathleen Holmes, leads on to the more functional subject of clothing and yet these works have a life of their own. I love them and the 'stories' they tell. Her philosophy brings her very much in line with our Monday artist, Joana Vasconcelos, on the role of women in society. 'My sculpture is an ongoing study of the dress as icon and metaphor. I use common domestic found objects and media (crocheted textiles, ceramic, glass) in the sculptures to symbolize, honor, humorize, and otherwise reference (reverently or irreverently) women and the many facets of their lives in family, history, and in contemporary society.'

The images I've chosen are just a tiny section of the two talented women's works and I urge you to follow the links to view further examples of their skill in using crochet to such great effect.

Andrea Uravitch - Praying Mantis and Moth Sampler

Kathleen Holmes -top image on flikr (courtesy of shop monkey), Reading in Bed (left) and The Archivist

2 comments:

Sriyana said...

Hi - I'm a new subscriber. I was very impressed when I found this blog, your posts are so interesting and informative. I'm really enjoying the current series on crochet artists. Thanks!

Bee Creative said...

Thank you for your very kind comments. The art stream this week has been really fun and interesting to research.