Saturday, February 19, 2011

Shroud of Ancient Echoes I & II
(Exhibition - ArtCloth: Engaging New Visions)

Susan Fell - McLean (Australia)

Preamble
This blogspot contains posts of artworks that have featured in my curated international exhibition - ArtCloth: Engaging New Visions. For your convenience I have listed these posts below.
ArtCloth: Engaging New Visions (Marie-Therese Wisniowski - Curator's Talk)
Sequestration of CO2 (Engaging New Visions) M-T. Wisniowski
Sacred Planet I (Engaging New Visions) J. Dunnewold
Under Pressure (Engaging New Visions) L.A. Beehler
lo Rising II & Giza (Engaging New Visions) R. Benson
Etruscan Relic (Engaging New Vision) J. Raffer Beck
Catch The Light 1 & 2 (Engaging New Visions) J. Schulze
Emerge (Engaging New Visions) J. Truckenbrod
Breathe Deeply (Engaging New Visions) C. Benn
Die Gedanken Sind Frei 3 & 4 (Engaging New Visions) C. Helmer
Black Birds I & II (Engaging New Visions) C. Holmes
Autumn Visions I & II (Engaging New Visions) J. Petruskeviciene
Razing/Raising Walls, Warsaw (Engaging New Visions) N. Starszakowna
Quite Alone Oasis… (Engaging New Visions) J. Urbiene
Nothing Is The Same I & II (Engaging New Visions) E. van Baarle
Discharge Thundercloud (Engaging New Visions) K. Kagajo
Cane Toad Narrative (Engaging New Visions) H. Lancaster
Visionary and Eclipse (Engaging New Vision) J. Ryder
Untitled ArtWorks (Engaging New Vision) Tjariya (Nungalka) Stanley and Tjunkaya Tapaya
Treescape (Engaging New Vision) A. Trevillian


Introduction
The Australian contribution to - ArtCloth: Engaging New Visions – will be on the blogspot for the next few weeks, thereby completing the contributions to this exhibition

The catalog of the exhibition is far more detailed in terms of opening addresses and artist’s biographies, curriculum vitae and statements etc. and moreover, is a holistic record of the exhibition itself.


Synopsis of Artwork: Shrouds of Ancient Echoes
The new vision - in Shrouds of Ancient Echos - I am celebrating is an echo, an improvisation, a new melody based on old know-how. Rhythms and repetitions, elements intrinsic to Itajime Shibori, become the echoes of this new melody. The rhythmic patterns that result from the process, honour traces of the past and inform my present. My interpretation of landscape uses the subtle colours of dyes sustainably extracted from indigenous eucalyptus leaves.

Only 150 years ago all colourants were derived from natural products, and while modern synthetic dyes enable the colouring of almost any material in a vast range of hues, such that our contemporary ideas of colour are rarely surprised, this sensibility of colour has developed in a very short time frame within our history. The resurgence of natural dyes as contemporary alternatives for colouring cloth is an exciting field that allows us to ‘walk lightly on the earth’.

Organic and muted hue from - E Melliodora (Yellow Box) - allow me to evoke a textural layered landscape of eroded rock surfaces, worn through time. I find a use for something discarded, iron scrim, which creates patterns of both continuity and individuality. Layers of colour and texture, details and shapes become palimpsests within the work.

The shroud - of natural wool fibre - acknowledges the role in the perpetual renewing cycle of life and death, as if time is a continuum.

Just like Echo, the mountain nymph of Greek Mythology, whose voice remains repeating the last words of others, Itajime shibori implies resonance and reflection. I suggest a process of unfolding and emerging, as I engage my viewer within transformations of the textile surface to reveal the beauty and subtleties inherent in Shibori as ArtCloth. Connections between land and cloth unfold, revisiting the resonances of the deep past and inviting new ways of perception.


Techniques
Itajime shibori on wool, using clamps, stitched resists and iron scrim. Dyed with leaves of Eucalyptus Melliodora (Yellow Box).
Size: Each piece is 60 (width) x 300(length) cm.

(a) Shrouds of Ancient Echoes I & II (Susan Fell-McLean) centre left artwork.
Fairfield City Museum and Gallery, NSW, Australia.
Photograph courtesy Cedric Boudjema, Director, Fairfield City Museum and Gallery

(b) Shrouds of Ancient Echoes I & II (Susan Fell-McLean) - right artwork.
Orange Regional Art Gallery, NSW, Australia (left artwork by Regina Benson - see earlier post).
Photograph courtesy Alan Sisley, Director, Orange Regional Art Gallery.

(c) Shrouds of Ancient Echoes I & II (Susan Fell-McLean) centre artwork.
Redcliffe City Art Gallery, Queensland, Australia.
Photograph courtesy Karen Tyler, Director, Redcliffe City Art Gallery. Photography by Al Sim.

(d) Shrouds of Ancient Echoes I & II (Susan Fell-McLean) centre artwork.
Wangaratta Art Gallery, Victoria, Australia.
Photograph courtesy Marie-Therese Wisniowski.

(e) Shrouds of Ancient Echoes I (Susan Fell-McLean) - full view.

(f) Shrouds of Ancient Echoes I (Susan Fell-McLean) - detailed view.

(g) Shrouds of Ancient Echoes II (Susan Fell-McLean) - full view.

(h) Shrouds of Ancient Echoes II (Susan Fell-McLean) - detailed view.

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