Monthly Archives: August 2012

Larry Schulte: The Half-Seen World

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TSGNY: What is your medium?

Larry Schulte: I have never worked in just one medium.  The two kinds of work that I’ve done most extensively and have exhibited the most are woven painted-paper pieces based on the Fibonacci sequence, which I have been making for nearly 40 years; and screenprints, which I have been making for about 10 years.

"Grid 8," 34" x 34," woven painted paper. Collection Museum of Nebraska Art.

LS: I also make small works that I can create at home rather than in the studio.  These include woven photographs, paper-punched photographs, and stitched prints and photographs. I like to play with a variety of media – each medium teaches me something that I can apply to the other work.

"Metallic Red, 2008, "4" x 6", paper-punched photographs.

TSGNY: How does working in a smaller format in other media inform your larger work?

LS: The small woven-photo pieces don’t take much time — I can complete one in two to three hours.  The photos are of patterns and textures that I might want to create in a larger work.  With the small woven-photo pieces, the image is already there, so I don’t have to spend additional time in image preparation. This lets me see in a single evening how a circle image will interact with a square pattern image, which I can then translate into a larger woven painted-paper piece, or a screenprint. Similarly, the paper-punch pieces let me see immediately the results of layering one pattern over another pattern.

"Bridge," 2011, 4" x 6", paper-punched photographs.

TSGNY: How did you begin the woven-paper work?

LS: I was getting my Master’s degree in watercolor and at the same time I was taking several weaving classes.  At some point, I started weaving a paper weft into the fiber warp on a loom.  Eventually I did away with the loom altogether and wove paper with paper by hand. I start with two pieces of heavy white all-cotton paper, paint each piece with acrylic paint (one for the warp, the other for the weft), cut them into strips and weave them together.

Cutting painted paper strips to weave.

LS: When I was weaving on a loom, I worked with all kinds of techniques: ikat, overshot patterns. The woven painted paper pieces have a more simplified structure. Originally, I used a plain weave, simply over-under.  As the works increased in size, I made a modification to a twill weave, over two under one. This modified twill was also an iteration of the Fibonacci Sequence.  The twill weave also allowed the strips of paper to be closer together in a tighter weave, which keeps the painted image more intact.

"Red Field," 2010, 54" x 54", woven painted paper.

LS: The work has never really been about the medium, though, it was about creating a visual image of mathematical structure.  It’s just that the woven painted-paper medium was one of the most satisfactory ways I found of creating a visual structure.

TSGNY: That visual structure has a strong mathematical basis. How did the Fibonacci sequence come to play such a central role in your work?

LS: I chose the Fibonacci sequence many years ago, for several reasons.  I was a mathematician before I ever started making art.  I have a degree in mathematics, and taught math for a few years.  Yet when I first started making art, I was painting landscape.  I grew up on a farm, and nature is an important part of my work.  In a way, I feel that all of my work is landscape.  The Fibonacci numbers are related to the structure of nature. They occur in everything that is a spiral:  pine cones, seashells. One of my favorite places the numbers show up is in the head of a sunflower.  There are two spirals of seeds in a sunflower head, one clockwise and the other counter-clockwise.  The numbers of seeds in the two spirals are always two consecutive Fibonacci numbers. The width of the strips I cut always varies proportionally to the numbers in the Fibonacci Sequence (1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, . . . each number always the sum of the two previous numbers).

"Squares 1," 2005, 4" x 6", woven photograph.

TSGNY: Your other main body of work is screenprinting on both paper and cloth.  When did you add that to the woven-paper work, and how does its imagery differ?

LS: I took a screenprinting class at Manhattan Graphics Center and responded immediately to the technique. I knew that I wanted to pursue it in depth.  I began creating patterns in Photoshop to use for the screens. Mathematics came into the work in the form of Moiré patterns as well as Fibonacci patterns of circles, lines, squares.

"Web Net Veil 86," 2010, 30"x 22", screenprint.

LS: My screenprinting images also include blueprints, EKG patterns, weaving patterns, topological charts.  I began layering all of these unrelated images to create new patterns. I called one grouping the “Chaos Series” because of the random way I was layering totally unrelated images.

"Science 65," 2012, 20" x 20", screenprint.

TSGNY: Does your choice of techniques enable you to do things you wouldn’t be able to do in other media?

LS: In all of my work, there is a kind of hiding, a kind of half-seeing, that requires the eye and mind to complete the image.  This is particularly true in the woven painted-paper pieces.  A circle painted on the piece of paper that become the warp strips still reads as a circle, even when half of the image is hidden under the weft strips.

"Culvert," 2010, 4" x 6", woven photographs.

LS: The same is true in the layering of ink in the screen prints.  The images I use always leave some open areas, so that the layers underneath show through. This “seeing through” would be difficult if you were strictly painting, or weaving, or drawing.

"Web Net Veil 10," 2009, 30" x 22", screenprint. Collection Dubuque Art Museum.

LS: I continue to explore this “half-seeing” in many media. When creating work to enter in the 9 x 9 x 3 exhibit, I experimented with layering felt for one piece, wrapping gridded wire with rayon in another, printing and stitching on cotton fabric for yet another.  Each of these experiments somehow involved layering, which seems to be a recurring theme in all my work.  The layering of felt started me thinking about other ways to create linear patterns.  The wrapped gridded wire started me thinking about other ways to create grids for screen printing that you could see through.  Stitching on cloth that has already been screenprinted is something I have been playing with for a couple of years, and may turn into a larger of body of work all on its own.  It’s a medium I want to investigate further.

"Untitled," 2011, 12" x 13", screen-printed stitched blacksilk.

TSGNY: Would you say your intent changes as a result of working with each new process?

LS: I am always amazed that I don’t know what my intent really is until a few years into a process.  For example, only in the past year did I begin to understand that part of what the layered screenprints are about is related to the internet, and the unlimited information that we take in each day.  The layering is a visual way of understanding and dealing with unlimited information.  Conceptually, I am dealing with the idea of creating pattern from chaos, mixing layers of unrelated images that result in a new structure. It’s as if I know intuitively what it is I am doing before I can verbalize what it is I have done.

"Untitled," 2011, 5" x 7", stitched photograph.

LS: My best work always comes when I allow the medium to work, when I don’t try to conceive too much in advance, when I simply respond to what has started.

"Science 84," 2012, 20" x 20", screenprint.

TSGNY: Thank you, Larry. Finally, are there living artists who inspire you who you feel we should know about?

LS: Living artists whose work I admire would include painter Steven Alexander, fiber artist Maureen Bardusk, painter and blogger Joanne Mattera, and TSGNY’s own Nancy Koenigsberg. My other influences include Kandinsky (especially his writings, including “Point and Line to Plane” and “Concerning the Spiritual in Art”); Mondrian, Anni Albers, Lenore Tawney, John Cage, Agnes Martin, and Gertrude Goldschmidt (Gego).  I’ve also been inspired and influenced by many outside of the visual arts world, particularly poets Mark Doty and Dale Kushner, pianist Aki Takahashi, choreographer Mark Morris, fiction writer Louise Farmer Smith, composers Eric Richards and Michael Byron, percussionist Haruka Fujii, and mathematician Stephen Wolfram.

I’ve collaborated with performing artists in the past, creating stage sets and woven costumes for a ballet company and very large-scale woven paper stage sets for the Japanese saxophonist Ryo Noda, when he performed at the Asia Society.

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Woven painted-paper stage design, 1988, 6 panels, each 8' x 4', Asia Society.

TSGNY: You can see more of Larry’s work on his website.

Gulia Huber: States of Human Presence

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TSGNY: Your work is not clothing in the traditional sense, but it clearly refers to clothing. How did you embark on this body of work?

Gulia Huber: During my graduate studies in art school at Penn State, the professor asked me to draw on skills that came from my personal life experience. I had worked as a costume designer in theater and film and as a clothing designer, so working with fabric, designing, drawing, making patterns, sewing and embroidering were familiar skills for me. I started by creating “Harness” out of rawhide, using materials and techniques that are usually applied to the craft of saddle-making. I cut a single piece of rawhide into many leather bands and connected them with grommets and buckles to make two human harnesses for a male and a female body.

"Harness" (2005); leather, metal accessories.

GH: In “Harness,” soft leather presents an idea about a human body and skin.  I used leather not only because of its look and texture but also because of its smell and capacity to change over time, to engage the viewer’s senses on multiple levels beyond the visual. “Harness” was a starting point for me; I wanted to explore these ideas, as well as to work with other soft materials. After working with leather I turned to flat sheets of rubber.

"Rubber Jackets" (2005), rubber, metal, polyester filler.

GH: Everyone relates to clothing on different levels, through touch, look, smell, and sound. “Rubber Jackets” is similar to “Harness” because it also affects the viewer’s perception through more than his/her visual sense.

TSGNY: What kind of artwork were you doing before “Harness” started you on this path?

GH: Before I started to explore the subject of human body and its boundaries through textiles, I was working with sculptural materials like plaster, wood, stone, and found objects.  I used carving, shaping, and molding to create  abstract representations of the human body. For my performances I used found objects like caution tape, iron bells, trunks and branches of old trees that had been cut down, and used them in the context of my subjective views about how we deal with obstacles and how our actions are driven by cultural influences.

TSGNY: Did switching from these materials to textiles change your intent?

GH: By purposely choosing a limited number of materials and processes for my works  that have long been classified as women’s crafts, I can express my feelings about accepted restrictive norms on women’s rights and freedoms. My work addresses issues of the gendered territories that are characteristic of every cultural system. Having been brought up on the intersection between Western and Eastern cultures, I experienced a variety of cultural norms that place women in the position of an object.

"Parachute" (2007); polyester fabric, accessories.

GH: I ask viewers to probe the questions: How far do we extend our personal boundaries? When does the destructive violation of the personal boundaries begin? What should one give up to retain personal freedom?

“Veil,” (2007); polyester fabrics, wire.

GH: In “Veil” I embroidered fabric with wire and then gently pressed this “ wired” textured fabric against my face, revealing a relief of my face as a part of this veil, commenting on women’s rights and cultural boundaries. As I began to explore these restrictive forces, and the changeable nature of boundaries posed by society, by culture and the inner self, I found that clothing can be a powerful metaphor for a human being, capable of standing in for a real person.  I began using sewing, knitting, and embroidery to create sculptural clothing or pieces of clothing that could embody emotional states of human presence.

“Red. Grace.” (2008) Performance, cotton, sand, foam board.

GH: I bring together different media such as video, performance, photography, and sound, but I continue to work with textiles and use the form of clothing because clothing defines our sexuality, reflects the world through which we define ourselves, contains an imprint of the private space that we create around ourselves, and also exposes a public space that we are immersed in.

“Yurt” (2008); cotton fabric, embroidery thread, rope, video projection.

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GH: My works refer to the body as an energy entity that is enclosed in layers of skin, clothing, building, air, and nature. I like to utilize light, height and the spaciousness of the room. And, like in any installation, the viewer is invited to be the part of the artwork. In “Yurt,” I created a structure similar to a nomadic yurt.  Inside the yurt, a shirt hangs on a hanger on the wall.  The white shirt is cut open in the middle, in the shape of a square from which a band embroidered with unreadable words falls on the floor, covering a video projection of a pit. Different cultural artifacts are thrown down the pit one by one.

TSGNY: The scale of your work is often very ambitious. Does your self-imposed limitation of techniques pose any particular challenges?

GH: In some way every work is a challenge for me. The works made out of leather and rubber led me to take the next challenging step: finding a visual solution to representing movement in space using simple fabrics bought in WalMart. When I start working on a project I have to think about how to transform a very simple piece of cotton or polyester fabric in a minimalist way to represent the idea I have in mind without violating the fabric’s own natural appeal.  I also pose a challenge to myself to use only two techniques — sewing and embroidery. For “Boots” I used only cotton quilted lining fabric.

"Boots" (2006): quilted cotton lining fabric.

GH: For “Table for Two” I challenged myself to create a glowing sensation of a table dinner setting using only vinyl. The sewn vinyl table cloth and a dinner setting for two are attached in one solid piece, glowing with light, signifying absence and presence at the same time.

"Table for Two" (2007); vinyl, light box, wooden table and chairs.

GH: Other challenges I’ve purposely posed for myself include sewing with wire in “Veil” and embroidering with human hair in “I Love, I Hate, I Need, I Protest.”

“I Love, I Hate, I Need, I Protest” (2005); cotton fabric, human hair, hangers.

GH: In “I Love, I Hate, I Need, I Protest,” I embroidered the words using human hair in order to emphasize the innately human nature of these statements. These are inborn desires, just as natural as our skin or hair.  I’ve also challenged myself to embroider while being completely covered by a black bag in “Trespassing”; and even to sew and burn a dress while performing.   In “Fire Dance” I danced with my very long, very wide dress on fire, while the photographer took over 300 photographs. It was a well planned performance, so nobody was hurt. As you can see, to me there are no limits in using textiles.

TSGNY: If you feel that the expressive capacity of textiles is unlimited, do you also feel that working with textiles enables you to do things you had not been able to do in any other medium?

GH:  Working with textiles made me realized how far I could push boundaries. I’ve used my own body as part of the process of art making. I’ve asked myself the question: “How would I feel if sewing is the only action I can take speaking about my body?” In “Trespassing,” I created a series of pieces that explored the process of constructing an identity within cultural norms, restrictions, and gendered territories.

“Trespassing” (2008); performance, polyester fabric, embroidery thread.

GH:  I created this performance in the context of women’s rights. Viewers witnessed my gradual “appearance” through the means of embroidery. I would come out hidden under a huge bag that I had sewed out of silky fabric in dark night-sky blue. At the beginning of this performance the viewers couldn’t know who was under this formless bag. Then I began embroidering the outline of my body with the gold thread. Within 20 minutes they could see that I was expressing myself even though I was under the bag. I used video as a tool to document my performance, altering the viewing time: in real time it took 20 minutes to complete this performance, but the video is five minutes long.

TSGNY:  Finally, are there any living artists who inspire you who you feel we should know about but may not have heard of?

GH: I’m fascinated by the variety of artists who aspire to bring textiles to the front of fine art and to make it stand on its own alongside other less perishable media. Many artists, like Yinka Shonibare, explore their ideas through clothing. The ideas relating to the phenomenology of the body, particularly physicality of the feminine body,  in the works of Ann Hamilton, Mona Hatoum and Jana Sterbak, influenced me to incorporate sensory experiences in my sculptural works. The artworks of Beverly Semmes and Lucy Orta focus on portraying a social dimension of the space that body occupies. The artworks of Do Ho Suh and Nick Cave explore cultural dimensions in relation to the body.

TSGNY: Thank you, Gulia. You can see more of Gulia’s work on her website; and you can learn more about her company, PELAGOZ, which designs ergonomic clothing to help children with educational needs here.