Feminist Craft of Care for Times of Crisis: a presentation panel
A WAY Online Art Gallery
Open Call - Submit your Story
Work in Progress - Funded Art book Project
Feminist Craft of Care for Times of Crisis: a presentation panel
On May 13th @6:30pm-8:00pm PST, I will be presenting at an artist panel “Feminist Craft of Care for Times of Crisis”, alongside Lena Chen & Sarah Shamash. The panel is part of Digital Carnival Z an annual festival run by Cinevolution Media Arts. I’m very excited to be part of such a well run event and to be presenting with such amazing and talented artists. Register online through Eventbrite to attend the event for free.
I will present works from the past several years which investigate notions of labour, productivity, and the value of art in relation to craft and women’s work. Instead of becoming reliant on computers and other advanced technologies that are accelerating the speeds of production and consumption alike, I choose to look back to centuries-old practices that have been passed down through generations of women. I explore the parallel between repetitive processes and computer programming by taking on the role of a machine.
By embracing time-consuming processes such as hand-stitching, I emphasize the importance and value of women’s labour. As a female artist, my labour is feminized and inherently connected to women’s domestic work. I challenge expectations of traditional craft by introducing conceptual layers and experimentation with new media. Throughout my artist talk, I will bring awareness to the value of feminine art forms and the connection between craft and fine art.
A WAY Online Art Gallery
GlitchSeries04 - Crop_1_crop.jpg, Archival inkjet print and embroidery, 11 x 14 inches, 2019
Glitch Series 04 is available for sale at A WAY Online Art Gallery for the next couple months, check out their website for my work and art by some other amazing artists!
Open Call - Submit your Story
Women’s stories surrounding pain will be chosen to be part of a conceptual art book project, mirrored with images of delicate handkerchiefs and embroidery.
Submit your anonymous stories and experiences of when you felt the need to hide either your emotional/physical pain in order to avoid pity or shame for being too sensitive.
Let us contradict the stereotype of women as pure and fragile by demonstrating the perseverance, dedication, and strength of women.
Work in Progress - Funded Art book Project
The past month has been jammed packed with many hours of cross-stitching, as I begun working on my project funded by the Canada Council for the Arts. First, I received my new embroidery stand and hoops in the mail. Second I fully prepped a piece of Aida cloth by securing the edge with stitches, to prevent fraying. I even marked the vertical and horizontal middles with stitches, which is something I rarely do!
For this project, I am creating an art book consisting of scans of my Ama’s original handkerchiefs and corresponding cross-stitched replications of each pattern.
I have chosen and scanned nine handkerchiefs, which I am converting into cross-stitch patterns. Using the patterns, I am cross-stitching nine embroidered pieces (approx. 6x6 inches each), which are scanned once completed.
After each cross-stitch piece is completed, I will mirror the cyclical structure of a woman’s existence and allude to the concept of invisibility, by recycling the same piece of Aida cloth and the same strands of embroidery thread for each new pattern. I will unravel each completed cross-stitch replication and re-stitch the next handkerchief by reusing the same material.
The art book will consist of pages with a scan of a handkerchief on the left and a scan of the corresponding cross-stitched piece on the right. It will also include stories selected from an anonymous open call (Submit your story to be a part of the project). The stories will be examples from women who have had to hide or pretend that they were not in pain in order to avoid pity or shame for being too sensitive.
Throughout April, I completed three of the nine cross-stitch pieces. Each piece took an average of 25 hours to cross-stitch and 14 hours to unstitch. It’s weird to think that the only evidence of these works will be the final scans/images that will be included in the art book. Although it may seem unusual, it adds to the conceptual aspects of the work, by emphasizing the invisibility of the labour. This connects to the idea of women’s labour and pain as invisible.
I acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts.
