R.I.P.

I.

I weep for Adonais-he is dead!

O, weep for Adonais! though our tears

Thaw not the frost which binds so dear a head!

And thou, sad Hour, selected from all years

To mourn our loss, rouse thy obscure compeers,

And teach them thine own sorrow, say: "With me

Died Adonais; till the Future dares

Forget the Past, his fate and fame shall be

An echo and a light unto eternity!"

-Stanza I of Adonais by Percy Shelley

R.I.P. Alexander McQueen

Allison Smith's Fancy Work

So this is the giant 25'x25' quilt I and a great group of people helped to make with Allison Smith and it's up in the SFMoMA, for this weekend only I believe, to celebrate the 75th anniversary of the museum. I should have taken a picture of the entire room so you could understand the scale and the way everything is situated but...the lanterns on the floor are about to the top of my knees maybe higher and the candle was about my height or maybe 6 ft tall so that makes the mirror maybe the size of the quilt from the center out to the brownish purple pinkish area after the white...maybe? I don't know but everything has been enlarged from what they would normally be manufactured as, if that makes any sense. And the mirror is opposite the quilt so you can see it reflected all psychedelic like and the lanterns were scattered around. There were also a couple of tables and chairs/benches for the lectures and the musicians that would come around later in the evening which I didn't go to unfortunately. So that amazingly gross chartreuse green color? Yeah helped print that [among just one or two others but that one is my favorite] and I could tell you all the colors of diamonds I helped to cut but uh that would be boring. Anyway I had a really great time working with everyone and I am so amazed at the way it turned out [they finished the sewing while I was on winter break so I didn't really know just how big it would be...or how amazing]. Not a big fan of quilts but I'm a fan of history and collaboration so I say success!

Lauren Kalman

It's so disgusting but...lovelove. These are some pieces from Lauren Kalman's Hard Wear series. I normally don't like to read what artist's have to say about their work usually because it's some enlightened transcendentalist metaphysical content based thing that I can't connect back to the piece itself but I liked this part of what she had to say about these pieces: 

 "In contrast, I present gold jewelry as a vehicle to amplify taboo aspects of the body. I fabricate gold adornment to highlight where the interior body transgresses its boundaries making organs, imperfections and diseases visible. The form of the adornment often reflects malignant excrescences, such as rupturing membranes or cancerous growths. These gleaming outgrowths cause bodily residues to be shed as they spread orifices and tear skin. When the beauty of gold is alloyed with the seeping body the objects become both intriguing and repulsive."

PIG 05049

Christien Meindertsma did this amazing project that I believe took over three years to complete. She followed all the products made from one single pig [PIG 05049]. Every little piece of that little piggy was used for something, most things you would expect and a lot more that you wouldn't. For example: ammunition, brakes, gum, photo paper, porcelain, paint... The exhibit of PIG 05049 looked incredibly interesting. Meindertsma packaged each thing as you would see meat packaged in a grocery store and placed everything in the freezer set up. A wonderfully detailed beautiful looking book was created as a catalogue for each product from PIG 05049. [I found this project relevant because of using pig gut in textiles]