Art Practice Commons^™

Blanket Statements, Issue 113, Fall 2013

Blanket Statements: News Publication of the American Quilt Study Group

Blanket Statements, Issue 113, Fall 2013

Blanket Statements, Issue 112, Summer 2013

Blanket Statements: News Publication of the American Quilt Study Group

Blanket Statements, Issue 112, Summer 2013

Path - Loss, Gregory S. Cook

School of Art, Art History, and Design: Theses and Student Creative Work

The term “path loss” could be considered somewhat idiomatic – it refers at once to a very specific technical definition and an easily relatable conceptualization, but perhaps its most immediate read is one of defeat, literally “a path, lost.” I find this beautifully problematic. In its original end as a term in radio-engineering, it’s used to describe the attenuation of a signal through physical space on its way to a receiver – that is, “path loss” describes some kind of thin-ness of intensity, the parts of something snagged along the way; parts caught in bedrock, lost in soil, or tangled …

Blanket Statements, Issue 111, Spring 2013

Blanket Statements: News Publication of the American Quilt Study Group

Blanket Statements, Issue 111, Spring 2013

Constructions, Sean Ryan Larson

School of Art, Art History, and Design: Theses and Student Creative Work

I have always been drawn to investigating the nature of ambiguous objects; objects whose role is unclear; objects that fall between distinct categories, and that exist in what appears to be transitional stages. The pieces I make provoke the imagination by building in experimental self-defined systems that refer to contemporary architecture, as well as comment on the ceramic and non-ceramic process. My pieces vary in form and intention just as the skyline carries changes in form and order. I want to make experimental objects that develop in front of me from the ground up, without a pre-planned result. Using fundamental …

Geographies Of Story, Emma Nishimura

School of Art, Art History, and Design: Theses and Student Creative Work

Family stories are told and retold, evolving over time with new details and other layers. One story merges with the next, while photographic images, oral and written accounts dissolve into the fabric of memory, building the family narrative. Both individual and collective, these histories continue to grow and transform as a new language is created, one that is visual, written, spoken and unspoken. As the complexities develop, the impact of these stories on our lives and the need to make sense of them in relation to our own identities increases. Yet, as I wade through my own family’s tales, the …

Blanket Statements, Issue 114, Winter 2013–2014

Blanket Statements: News Publication of the American Quilt Study Group

Blanket Statements, Issue 114, Winter 2013–2014

Uncoverings: The Research Papers Of The American Quilt Study Group, Volume 34 (2013), Lynne Zacek Bassett, Hallie E. Bond, Cheryl Cheek, Sharon Fulton Pinka, Merikay Waldvogel, Sarah Bliss Wright

Uncoverings Journal

Preface by Lynne Zacek Bassett

Adirondack Quilts and Comforters: A Regional Study by Hallie E. Bond

The "Cooish" Rescue of the Quilt in Harry Kelly's Cottage by Cheryl Cheek

Lowcountry Chintz: The Townsend/Pope Quilt Legacy by Sharon Fulton Pinka

Printed Panels for Chintz Quilts: Their Origin and Use by Merikay Waldvogel

Alabama Cotton and Bemis Bags: Pieced into Quilt History by Sarah Bliss Wright

Contributors

Index

Review Of Michel & Nosch, Eds., Textile Terminologies In The Ancient Near East And Mediterranean From The Third To The First Millennia Bc., Carol Bier

Textile Research Works

Textile production comprised the major manufacturing industry of the ancient Near East and eastern Mediterranean, yet it has received relatively little scholarly attention. As garments and furnishings, textiles may provide warmth and utility, but they are also indicators of status, objects of trade and tribute, products of technology, and economic generators. The role of textiles is both pervasive and complex, yielding rich and specific vocabularies that do not easily transcend time and space for contemporary understanding. This brilliant volume offers a compilation of twenty-two papers that result from an exciting collaboration between the Danish National Research Foundation's Centre for Textile …

Blanket Statements, Issue 109, Fall 2012

Blanket Statements: News Publication of the American Quilt Study Group

Blanket Statements, Issue 109, Fall 2012

The Mamluk Kaaba Curtain In The Bursa Grand Mosque, Sumiyo Okumura

Textile Society of America: Symposium Proceedings

A Kaaba curtain is a door curtain which covers the door of the holy Kaaba, the most sacred site of Islam in Mecca. Upon the occasion of the conquest of Egypt and Hejaz by Sultan Selim I in 1517, Selim I donated a Kaaba door curtain to the Bursa Grand Mosque, one of the five most important mosques in the Islamic World. This Mamluk curtain is very different from Ottoman Kaaba curtains in both its shape and design motifs. It is noticeable that five fragments, including a piece of inscription, hang down from the upper border. We see a similar …

The Kanga, A Cloth That Reveals- Co-Production Of Culture In Africa And The Indian Ocean Region, Phyllis A. Ressler

Textile Society of America: Symposium Proceedings

The Kanga is one of Africa's least understood textiles. As a simple cotton, colorful, hand and machine printed cloth it embodies dynamic historical co-production of culture throughout African and Indian Ocean trade networks. Exploring African mercantile trade history, the coproduction and exchange of iconography, the diverse use and meanings of the Kanga, suggests a valuable discursive role for this textile. Despite its longevity of more than 150 years, its significant role in creation of identities, and its contribution to communication through design and social meaning, the Kanga, receives limited attention in textile research. Though seen by many as a simple …

The Parenthetical Notation Method For Recording Yarn Structure, Jeffrey C. Splitstoser

Textile Society of America: Symposium Proceedings

Until now, describing yarn structure has been more art than science, especially for complex yarns and cordage like those encountered at Cerrillos, a Paracas (ca. 900-100 B.C.E.) site in the Ica Valley of Peru, where yarns and cordage frequently involve multiple colors, sub-structures, and materials (e.g., Image 1). My early attempts at describing yarn structures using notation were essentially undecipherable to others. Likewise, narrative methods proved too wordy and no less confusing. (For instance, a narrative description of the structure of specimen 2001-L185-B1654- S001, a rope-like yarn pictured in Images 2 and 3, would be: Twelve Z-spun-singly-ply yarns Ztwisted with …

The Twenty-First Century Voices Of The Ashanti Adinkra And Kente Cloths Of Ghana, Carol Ventura

Textile Society of America: Symposium Proceedings

Craft production and use are continually adapting to meet the needs of consumers and the market in order to survive. The Adinkra and Kente cloths of Ghana are no exception, having maintained their visibility and viability by addressing changing and challenging economic and political realities. Fabric strips are sewn together to produce rectangular Adinkra and Kente cloths that are wrapped around human bodies in styles determined by gender and rank. These cloths are not only beautiful, but communicate as well. Old and new symbols representing proverbs, beliefs, and politics are woven into Kente and printed onto Adinkra cloths. Commemorative fabrics …

Queen Alexandra’S 1902 Coronation Gown, Donald Clay Johnson

Textile Society of America: Symposium Proceedings

Queen Victoria's wearing black mourning clothes for 40 of the 63 years of her reign prompted much discussion between fashion-setting Prince Edward and Princess Alexandra about what should the new queen wear for her coronation, the first state occasion in which they, as king and queen, could define taste and fashion for what was to become the Edwardian era. With such a long interval of time since the last coronation there were no strong expressions of traditional attire for such a ritual occasion which prompted the new king and queen to think expansively about the roles and functions the coronation …

Samplers, Sewing And Star Quilts: Changing Federal Policies Impact Native American Education And Assimilation, Lynne Anderson

Textile Society of America: Symposium Proceedings

Illustrating the U.S. federal government's changing policies on the assimilation of Native American children is the role of needlework instruction in the schooling of Indian girls. Described and discussed are three examples of 19th and 20th century policy, with emphasis on the textiles resulting from those policies. Early 19th century policy supported mission schools for Indians. Learning to sew was a valued domestic skill in 19th century female education, culminating in the making of a needlework sampler. This focus was adopted in mission schools, illustrated by Christeen Baker's 1830 sampler stitched at the Choctaw Mission School in Mayhew, Mississippi. Shortly …

Blanket Statements, Issue 108, Summer 2012

Blanket Statements: News Publication of the American Quilt Study Group

Blanket Statements, Issue 108, Summer 2012

Transcendent Materiality, Lauren E. Mabry

School of Art, Art History, and Design: Theses and Student Creative Work

I make painterly, abstract, ceramic objects. My obsession with surface and materiality compels me to investigate the relationship between images and objects through the inherent qualities of ceramic material. Primarily my work communicates directly, through its formal and aesthetic qualities, but it may also be understood in relationship to abstract painting, minimal work, and process art. I exploit the intrinsic qualities of ceramic material producing works that are warm, seductive, and surprising. Ultimately, my work is a synthesis of intuitive, expressive surfaces and elemental forms.

In this body of work there are two main forms: cylinders and curved planes- as …

Changsha: Photographs By Rian Dundon, Rian Dundon

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

Rian Dundon, whose photographs have previously appeared at China Beat, will soon be releasing a new book of photography on China, Changsha. Dundon’s book will feature a forward written by friend of the blog Gail Hershatter and includes his photos of and essays on the Hunan province city of Changsha. For more information, and to pre-order a copy of the book, see the book’s website (pre-sales of the book are part of a crowd-funding campaign raising funds for its first run with the publisher, Emphas.is). Below is a special teaser of Changsha material that Dundon has prepared for China Beat …

Blanket Statements, Issue 107, Spring 2012

Blanket Statements: News Publication of the American Quilt Study Group

Blanket Statements, Issue 107, Spring 2012

Someone/No One, Jamie L. Fritz

School of Art, Art History, and Design: Theses and Student Creative Work

I am obsessed with the pieces of existence; the memories, experiences and emotions that make up human identity. Our lives are defined by entropy that causes these pieces to fragment and become distorted over time. Looking back at the pieces they become almost unrecognizable, and it becomes unclear if they are something or if they are nothing. My work centers on a compulsive desire to put these pieces into something that makes sense. The photograph serves as a representation of the memory and experience, broken down into parts that remove them as a piece of an identifiable whole. The photographs …

The Decagonal Tomb Tower At Maragha And Its Architectural Context: Lines Of Mathematical Thought, Carol Bier

Textile Research Works

Of several brick tomb towers constructed at Maragha in western Iran before the Mongol conquests, one in particular, Gonbad-e Qabud (593 H. / 1196-97 C.E.), has generated significant recent attention for its unique patterns with pentagons and decagons. Gonbad-e Qabud is also unusual in having a decagonal plan. While both plan and decoration distinguish it from earlier and later towers at Maragha and elsewhere on the Iranian plateau, the ornamental patterns follow a long line of experimentation with geometric expressions that grace many pre-Mongol buildings in Iran. This article examines in particular the overlapping polygons and radial symmetries of the …

Stitching As Knowing: Mapping Nebraska With Textiles And Thread, Elizabeth Ingraham

School of Art, Art History, and Design: Faculty Publications and Creative Activity

Mapping Nebraska is a drawn, stitched and digitally imaged cartography of the state (physical, social, cultural, sociological) where I live. The interrelated components of this on-going project are:

• A 15 foot wide hand-drawn “Locator Map” of Nebraska, with every city, town, park, railroad, river, lake and creek drawn to scale on 95 Tyvek sections which were then stitched together.
• Terrain Squares, quilted and embroidered fabric relief forms of the physical topography of selected locations, using software to be able to see the terrain at a much larger scale (1 inch = 596 feet) than the Locator Map.
• Surveys, or on-the-ground …

Blanket Statements, Issue 110, Winter 2012–2013

Blanket Statements: News Publication of the American Quilt Study Group

Blanket Statements, Issue 110, Winter 2012–2013

Uncoverings: The Research Papers Of The American Quilt Study Group, Volume 33 (2012), Lynne Zacek Bassett, Nancy C. Bavor, Gloria Craft Comstock, Mary Ellen Ducey, Kathryn "Kitty" Ledbetter, Joan Laughlin

Uncoverings Journal

Preface by Lynne Zacek Bassett

Common Threads: Nine California Art Quilt Pioneers by Nancy Bavor

Hortense Horton Beck Tells Her Story: "I wanted to do something important" by Gloria Craft Comstock

The Palladian Quilt: Exploring the Possibilities by Mary Ellen Ducey and Joan Laughlin

Textiles, Print Culture and Nation Building in the 1840s by Kathryn Ledbetter

Contributors

Index

Blanket Statements, Issue 105, Fall 2011

Blanket Statements: News Publication of the American Quilt Study Group

Blanket Statements, Issue 105, Fall 2011

Art Practice As Research In The Classroom: A New Paradigm In Art Education, Julia Marshall, Kimberley D'Adamo

Kimberley D'Adamo: Art, Curriculum, Publications, and Other Scholarly Works

Student experiences at Berkeley High School reveal the generative potential of the art practice-as-research approach—how deep, broad, and creative the learning can be, and how powerful this model is in changing student attitudes toward art and themselves as artists and learners. This model of self-directed, inquiry-based learning works well because student art practice is cast as research and is structured as research. As a result, students make discoveries and connections that go beyond their expectations. They also acquire skills and understandings that transfer into their academic studies. In partic-ular, they find that learning can be engaging and that a trail …

Blanket Statements, Issue 104, Summer 2011

Blanket Statements: News Publication of the American Quilt Study Group

Blanket Statements, Issue 104, Summer 2011

Measured Chance, Brian R. Kluge

School of Art, Art History, and Design: Theses and Student Creative Work

In my practice I use clay to make enigmatic, non-representational sculptures that employ reductive geometry and archetypal forms. By pressing clay into a variety of molds, it is my intention to contrast a primal crudeness with a skilled precision in my handling of the material. I fabricate objects that range in scale from handheld to human- size. In this work, I combine references to the forms of manmade things with surfaces that allude to age and wear resulting from natural patinas that occur on stone, wood, or metal. This body of work shares qualities with the Minimalist and Earth Art …

Blanket Statements, Issue 103, Spring 2011

Blanket Statements: News Publication of the American Quilt Study Group

Blanket Statements, Issue 103, Spring 2011