The Field is Sown

Silk, thread / dyed, hand-stitched
30" x 48"
2010

The Field is Sown detail

Beneath

cotton, silk, iron oxide, thread / dyed, hand-stitched
36" x 40"
2002

Beneath DETAIL

Quietly

cotton, nylon / devoré
21" x 13"
2002

Quietly DETAIL

Soulskin: Seeding the Prairie

nylon, iron, copper, pigment / manual cloqué
82" x 42"
1999

Soulskin: Seeding the Prairie DETAIL

Beneath

cotton, silk, iron oxide, thread / dyed, hand-stitched
36" x 40"
2002

Beneath DETAIL

a remnant: Helianthus

linen blend, gold leaf, thread, / dyed, hand-stitched, devoré
48" x 84"
2011

a remnant: Helianthus DETAIL

Generations Side I (LEFT) Generations Side II (RIGHT)

nylon, iron, copper, pigment / manual cloqué
117" x 32"
2000

Generations DETAIL

Soulskin: Sun, Lake, Dragonfly

linen blend, pigment, gold leaf / dyed, devoré
90" x 54"
2000

Soulskin: Sun, Lake, Dragonfly DETAIL

I love the vulnerability that cloth shares with the natural world—fragile and tenuous, but also resilient and strong. Much of the fabric I use is derived from plants (linen, cotton) or insects (silk), so it is a natural medium for expressing the tactile quality of outdoor elements.

I dig in, or excavate, reaching below the surface of the cloth. My images build and evolve slowly, sometimes with just the hand-stitching of a single thread.

Devoré, or burn out, is a process that allows me to carve or etch deeply into the fibers, leaving a thin transparent veil holding the piece together.

Manual cloqué is my own method of working on fabric stretched under tension, resulting in deep dimensional relief—above and below the surface plane. And the process of waiting for cloth to rust has a welcome unpredictability.

The mark-making that results from all of these techniques is not just on the surface but through it. The image becomes part of the permanent structure of the cloth.

I usually cover the entire textile, presenting a multitude of marks. I’m interested in the impact that numerous marks make, collectively. Manipulating the cloth changes its inherent structure and weight, and that change determines its overall shape and the way it hangs in space. I like that the process can, at times, dictate the form.

ECHOES OF THE PRAIRIE: WORKS IN CLOTH

November 17, 2017 - January 25, 2018

The Box Gallery
Commerce Bank Building at 1000 Walnut Street, Kansas City, MO 64106

Click on this link to view more details of works in Echoes of the Prairie Exhibition.
Photo Credit of artwork to EG Schempf, Doug Koch

Artist Statement

Several years ago I rescued a remnant of original, unplowed native prairie in Missouri. Since then, I have been on a quest to preserve and protect this precious parcel of land and the creatures that depend upon it.

I immerse myself—learning all that I can about prairies; not just by reading, but by doing… restoring and reconstructing the degraded areas, reintroducing native plants that once grew there. This process involves being in close contact with organic forms found in earth, water, plants and wildlife. I focus on the sensory magic of the unique and rare prairie habitat, and its influence on what I make.

My work reflects my fascination with the overwhelming number of elements that surround me in this natural ecosystem of abundance, and my realization that every event, no matter how small, is vital to the inextricable web of life.

The prairie ecosystem is so rich and diverse—so alive with a riot of color, texture, moving shapes, sounds, and scents! It demands that you take it in with all of your senses. There are always discoveries and surprises.

Walking through a field I am suddenly in the midst of masses of sunflowers as far as I can see. They dance in waves, covered with thousands of tiny winged insects busily mating and munching. All fragile moving parts, making patterns and repetitions, encircling me and resonating collectively in a low hum... I am mesmerized. In a few days they will be gone, but where? By then, another prairie flower will burst open in multitudes, taking the sunflowers’ place, and bringing other insects that have evolved with it.

I turn around. Scores of tree swallows are dipping and diving aerodynamically over the pond at high speed, perfectly choreographed, tracing sweeping arched lines in the sky, then making concentric ripples in the water as they kiss the pond surface. Constantly twittering to each other, their joyful pace never abates. They have no fear. They never collide.

Such natural happenings suggest to me rhythms, patterns and cycles. Ethereal wing patterns of a newly metamorphosed dragonfly, the low pulsating drone of bullfrogs at night, mathematically arranged seed heads unfolding—I observe and anticipate these occurrences—how they gradually emerge, change and repeat as if according to plan, season after season, year after year.

And so, back in my studio, I impose my own ordering of marks on cloth.

These repetitive visual marks are recordings of what I see, hear and touch. For example, I can express a sound I hear with a line or a shape. And cloth, as my medium, manifests the natural, tactile environment from which it came.

Outdoors, I am conscious of millions of elements being coded—they fit together—and it is this orchestration that energizes me. A harmony of flight patterns, a cacophony of calls and cries at dawn, the simple repetitive drumbeat of an incessant insect. My work is in response to nature's rhythm.

Susan Lordi Marker
November 2017