Source: Surface Design Association

Devotion: Sewing the Sacred

As makers, we often ask ourselves “What does devotion look like in a material form?” There are purposeful acts we make by choice and other behaviors that we perform out of ritual and habit. The cycles and loops of daily life can sometimes seem mundane, forgettable, and otherwise ordinary. Perhaps through these repetitive and devotional processes of textile production, we can see something meaningful, surprising, and even sacred emerge in the humble routines of handwork and daily life. The idea that a link exists between the sacred and the mundane is a constant and universal theme within the human story. This Exhibition In Print seeks to reveal these narratives and invited artists using many material traditions to explore the theme as it manifests in their particular and idiosyncratic lives.

From Emily:

Reveal truths, conceal secrets. Nostalgic ties. Beautiful objects. Tell stories. Share community. Provide warmth, shelter; comfort. To create a textile is to engage with the past and the present as one.

“More Than A Sum of Her Parts” and “21st Century Altar” use quilt motifs from New England, where I grew up. At four, my paternal grandmother taught me to hand quilt. To master this skill, I thought, was to earn her approval and admiration.

Quilting, at the time, was a personal symbol of contentment, solace and family. Older now, I recognize nothing is so simple.

The space and layers present in both works represent the depth of generational knowledge which informs individuals within the nuanced American identity.

The act of quilting is a dedication to labor; a commitment to time. The often-overlooked care and devotion that goes into making a quilt; sharing a narrative. The string of moments that can be charted across the length of a single thread, pulled in between the sheath of fabric; binding these moments into the cloth.

The quilt is forever rooted in feminine labor. The muscle memory of how to stitch and smooth a square is entwined in childhood memories, far away living rooms, kitchens and meetinghouses. Too often contemporary quilting is seen as a monolith; a hobby devoid of its context. The heart of these soft objects owes endless debt to the women, in particular Black women, who express their own perspectives and histories through the medium.

In the end, the most important things we can leave behind are our stories.

Together, the rooted richness and all-encompassing transparent veil is an altar to time and knowledge.

The gold bricks, an assignment of value. In the void between the above and below, the viewer is asked to consider their body in its presence.

How do I relate to those who have come before me?

To honor labor that has been dismissed?