Christy Matson exhibits her works, titled “Currents 38”
by admin
Currents 38: Christy Matson
Milwaukee Art Museum
February 25–July 17, 2022
Bradley Family Gallery
Currents 38 presents 45 of Matson’s woven pictures made between 2016-2021, including never-before-seen works she made for the exhibition. All of the works in the exhibition were made on TC2 looms including the one in Matson’s Los Angeles studio as well as TC2 looms at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, The Oregon College of Arts and Crafts and the Textilsetur Residency in Blonduos, Iceland.
The woven pictures featured in Currents 38 resemble paintings, yet they are deeply rooted in weaving traditions. Weaving on the TC2 loom, the Los Angeles–based artist Christy Matson (b. 1979) is able to pair new ideas and technologies with her knowledge of the centuries-old craft to create thoughtful, innovative compositions.
Though she works with textiles, Matson’s pieces share in the language of painting. Her woven pictures participate in minimalism, abstraction, and decoration and, hung on a wall, are not utilitarian. The work often employs historical weaving structures and techniques to explore memory; the gendered history of textile production, long considered a feminized form of labor; and issues around sustainability. Matson’s work honors the historical medium and reflects the strong, recent embrace of fiber by contemporary artists.
Since 1982 the Milwaukee Art Museum has invited “artists who have recently come to public attention and who are challenging or expanding the definition of art in our time” to participate in the Currents series. Matson is the first Currents weaver, which also speaks to the present state of textiles within contemporary art. Currents exhibitions have featured the work of artists Rachel Harrison, Cindy Sherman, and Felix Gonzalez-Torres, and of craftspeople Richard DeVore, Gord Peteran, and Robert Turner, among others. Matson is the first fiber artist to be featured in the Currents exhibition series.
A fully illustrated catalogue accompanies the exhibition and is the first publication dedicated to Matson’s woven work. And here’s a video featuring Matson’s woven works and the process that went behind creating them: LINK
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