Margarita Cabrera

A self-defined social practices artist, Margarita Cabrera’s work is often fueled by collaboration from community engagement in order to get a holistic view of social issues. Materials such as US Border Patrol uniform and cochineal-dye, are used, and transformed, to deliver a multi-tiered conversation on topics such as globalism, populism, and the migrant experience. Often in playful representation, such as a landscape of soft-sculpture potted desert plants with colorful embroidery, or mimicking parrots made from found border patrol uniforms, to collaged works on paper made with cochineal dye, Cabrera implores viewers to confront contentious topics by utilizing materials tied inextricably to the issue.

Margarita Cabrera was born in Monterrey, Mexico, and moved to El Paso, TX at the age of 10. She received her BFA in Sculpture (1997) and her MFA in Combined Media (2007) from Hunter College in New York, NY. Cabrera is an associate professor at the Arizona State University Herberger Institute for Design and the Arts. Recent solo exhibitions have been held at the Longmont Museum of Art, Longmont, CO; McNay Art Museum, San Antonio, TX; Dallas Contemporary, Dallas, TX; and the Wellin Museum of Art, Clinton, NY. Her work has been included exhibitions at the Barbican Centre, London, UK; Denver Museum of Art, Denver, CO; the Museum of Contemporary Art Cleveland, Cleveland, OH; Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh, PA; Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, CA; the Smithsonian Museum of American Art, Washington, D.C.; the Museum of Fine Arts Houston, Houston, TX; the Contemporary Arts Museum Houston, Houston, TX; the Ford Foundation Gallery, New York, NY; Seattle Art Museum, Seattle, WA; the Sweeney Art Center for Contemporary Art at the University of California, Riverside, Riverside, CA; the Sun Valley Center for the Arts, Location; El Museo del Barrio, New York, NY; and El Museo Rufino Tamayo, Mexico City, Mexico.

In 2012 she was a Knight Artist in Residence at the McColl Center for Visual Art in Charlotte, NC. Cabrera was also a recipient of the Joan Mitchell Foundation Grant, presenting a community public art sculpture commissioned by Lego at Discovery Green in Houston, Puentes Culturales. In May 2019, Cabrera unveiled her monumental, participatory public sculpture Árbol de la Vida: Memorias y Voces de la Tierra in San Antonio, Texas, and was named Texas Artist of the Year. Cabrera has also been selected as a recipient of the 2023-24 Latinx Artist Fellowship.

Bisa Butler

Hyperallergic writes on artist Bisa Butler:

Bisa Butler has a great name; it has almost a rock star quality. But she wasn’t born with it. Mailissa Veronica Yamba grew up in New Jersey, the daughter of a Ghanian-born university president (at Essex County College in Newark) and a French teacher from New Orleans. She graduated from Columbia High School in 1991, married, earned undergraduate and graduate degrees in painting and art education, and taught high school art for a decade while raising her children.

The story will sound familiar to many women artists. However, Butler has recently emerged as a significant art-world presence, with her first solo museum exhibition, Bisa Butler: Portraits, currently on view at the Art Institute of Chicago. (The exhibition opened in 2020 at the Katonah Museum of Art in upstate New York.) Butler gained success, quite remarkably, through the often-marginalized medium of quilting. Yet, what might seem like an overnight success is not. Butler had been showing work for 20 years with other African American quilt artists under the auspices of the curator, writer, and artist Carolyn Mazloomi. Butler was known in these circles, but it was not until three years ago that she surmounted biases in the contemporary art world against both people of color and fiber arts.

Butler’s breakthrough happened in 2018 at an art fair, Expo Chicago. Her work, presented by Claire Oliver Gallery, sold out during the first hour of the preview. I remember running into friends at the fair who asked breathlessly, “Did you see those quilts?” When Erica Warren, the textile curator at the Art Institute of Chicago, first saw the work at Expo, she was “transfixed and astonished.” “When the works came into my view in the crowded exhibition hall,” she told me by email, “there were a few particulars that really grabbed my attention, including the vibrant colors and patterns, the discerning gazes of the portraits’ subjects, and the balance and dynamism of the figural arrangements.” The Art Institute of Chicago subsequently acquired a major work, “The Safety Patrol” (2018). 

Butler’s work draws on the rich history of African American art: Her legacy lies with enslaved women creating embroidered quilts from scraps, her grandmother’s and mother’s needlework, Romare Bearden’s pioneering collages, AfriCOBRA’s self-fashioned aesthetics of the African Diaspora, James Van Der Zee’s studio photographs of elegant Black New Yorkers during the Harlem Renaissance, and activist artists — for instance, Faith Ringgold, whose monumental, Guernica-inspired vision of a race riot, “American People Series #20: Die,” (1967), was set in conversation with Picasso’s “Les Demoiselles d’Avignon” (1907) when the renovated Museum of Modern Art opened in 2019. It was the Gee’s Bend quilts, however, in an exhibition at the Whitney Museum of American Art in 2002, that inspired Butler, then a graduate student, to work with fabric.

Stephanie Hirsch

Through her use of beads, sequins and embroidery, Stephanie Hirsch's canvases are literally 'illuminated' with phrases of enlightenment and hope. Continuing her personal investigations into individual development through text, Hirsch ups the ante by removing the "easy access" of familiar graphic elements inspired by iconic punk-rock album covers and adding a recognizable figurative element. The use of the figurative element humanizes her compositions and is based upon self-portraits driven by her fascination on the whole social media "selfie" craze.  Wanting to delve deeper into how "selfies" create an image of how we want to be portrayed in the world rather than who we actually are, she shot her "selfies" while saying and feeling the emotional content in the compositions.  Hirsch states, "I was also inspired by Cindy Sherman's work titled 'Aging Socialite.' Sherman perfectly executed the daunting look in the eyes that spoke of insecurity and fear of a life no longer lived.  My fear of just existing while living promoted my 'selfie' study as well.  I am also profoundly influenced by Barbara Kruger whose text based work questions autonomy and desire, which I yearn and struggle for within myself."

 

The journey of how Hirsch struggles with her external and internal self creates a unique entry point for the artwork.  The viewer can identify and reflect upon their own personal experiences by simply reading the words and connecting with the visage.  This simple, yet profound shift creates the intimate and introspective underpinning to the work allowing the viewer to oscillate between the beauty of the materials and the message implied. Using insights like "I'd Rather Die on My Feet than Live on My Knees," "I Was Not Built to Break," "We All Find Our Way," and "It's Never Too Late," Hirsch weaves a story of overcoming one's personal adversity and building an inner spirituality that hopefully filters out into the world.

 

Stephanie Hirsch has shown in exhibitions in New York, the Hamptons, Miami and San Francisco. She was a featured artist in Miami Design District's Art Walk (2012) and showcased in the Mercedes Benz VIP lounge at Lincoln Center during New York Fashion Week (2012).  Hirsch was among 30 artists commissioned to create a unique commemorative crown for display in Harrods (London) in celebration of the Queen's Diamond Jubilee (2012). Hirsch is the founder of Inca resort wear and author of "Mother Nurture," published by William Morrow (2008).  She lives and works in New York City.

Thomas Lanigan-Schmidt

A pop-cultural connoisseur with a magpie’s eye for what shimmers and shines, Thomas Lanigan-Schmidt has been using plastic wrap, reflective foil, colored beads, pipe cleaners, glitter, staples and photographs for more than 40 years to create shrines to saints, sacred and secular, emblematic of queer identity. He includes himself among the elect in an early collage titled “Twinky as a Prima Ballerina (Self-Portrait),” completed in 1969, the year of the Stonewall Rebellion, in which he participated.

Lanigan-Schmidt began by exhibiting his art in his own apartment; an early major exhibit in 1969 was titled The Sacristy of the Hamptons. Another home exhibit was titled The Summer Palace of Czarina Tatlina.  In these early home exhibits, and also in at least one later recreation of an early exhibit, he guided visitors through the exhibit in drag in character as art collector Ethel Dull.

While Lanigan Schmidt's art is not widely known, he has received critical acclaim.

Reasons for Thomas Lanigan-Schmidt's art not reaching a wider audience totally elude me. This is major, major work, reflecting and augmenting today's dialogue in a unique and commanding voice. Many artists, including a generation of Lanigan-Schmidt's students, have been repeatedly amazed, inspired and guided by its panache, rapier-sharp wit, subversiveness and opulent beauty.

—Robert Kushner, Art in America

 

 

Maria Creyts

Artist Maria Creyts creates extraordinarily long photos depicting subjects she designs from textiles.  Her works are concerned with hand-sewn garments as subjects in same-scale photography.  Large photo compositions and the clothing subjects themselves are often exhibited together with the matching image and subject just out of view of each other.  Complete ensembles suspended on hangers seem like mysterious gallery goers whose boldly patterned dress outshines the individual to the point that we do not see him or her at all.

In 2012 the artist focused on custom clothing design while preparing an African-themed fashion collection for Kansas City’s West 18^th Street Fashion Show.  Through this, she acquired further skill in sewing and explored how clothing design and construction could help in planning a purpose for her sewn subjects beyond the photo shoot.

During December and January 2011-2012, Creyts spent time learning batik techniques in Nigeria under artist Niké Davies Okundaye with the goal of introducing the artist’s own hand into her photo friezes through designing fabrics for photography subjects.  For the menswear ensemble she photoed, Creyts used hot wax to draw and print imagery on 7 yards of seersucker.  The motif used unites the amusing story of her visit to an African palace with traditional Nigerian stencil designs that portray a European royal couple.

About the artist

Maria Creyts is a graduate of Yale University School of Art and her studio, ESTUDIO mariaurora, is in Kansas City, Missouri.  The artist’s photo friezes have stretched over walls at the Visual Arts Gallery of the University of Lagos, Nigeria (2012), Leedy-Voulkos Art Center in Kansas City (2011), and Centro Fotográfico Manuel Álvarez Bravo in Oaxaca, Mexico (2010).  In "Panoramic Patterns” (Kansas City Star, 4/21/2011), critic Dana Self described the artist as "...a curious media traveler, someone who refuses to let a material’s limitations or its nature stand in the way of her inquisitiveness.”  artist website:  http://mariaurora.net

Maira Kalman

Working as an illustrator, author, and designer, Maira Kalman illuminates contemporary life with a profound sense of joy and a unique sense of humor. 

Kalman speaks of her work as a form of journalism. She uses writing and drawing to render an ongoing account of the world as she sees it. Hers is a daily discipline of creativity based on photography, travel, research, walking, talking, and open observation. A serious love of distraction pervades. Abundant depictions of fashion, food, art, and architecture represent life’s great pleasures. At the same time rubber bands, pieces of moss, bobby pins, and snacks stake a claim for smaller forms of satisfaction. All of this might seem pretty trivial were it not for the counterweight of history, memory, and loss that is also ever-present. Chaos is another constant, be it crazy and madcap or simply devastating.

Indeed, it is her work’s gift to illuminate those things that affirm our own capacity for joy, sadness, humor, charm. In short, Kalman’s art inspires our humanity in light of life’s overwhelming events and details.

Maira Kalman (b. 1949 Tel Aviv, lives New York) is the author of twelve children’s books including Ooh-la-la (Max in Love). Among her adult classics are The Elements of Style, an illustrated edition of Strunk and White’s timeless grammar, and The Principles of Uncertainty, a picture book of essays based on a yearlong online column for The New York Times. She has just completed a second online epic for The Times titled And the Pursuit of Happiness.

Kalman’s best known work, created with fellow illustrator Rick Meyerowitz, is New Yorkistan: a cartoon map of the city designated by tribes, such as Pashmina, Irant, and Irate. When it ran on the cover of The New Yorker in December 2001, it sanctioned a first burst of laughter in the aftermath of 9/11. A relatively more secret aspect of her identity is as the “M” in M&Co, the revolutionary design firm founded by her late husband, Tibor Kalman, with whom she was a constant collaborator. The firm’s famous 10-One-4 watch is based on one of her doodles. She has collaborated on projects with the fashion designer Isaac Mizrahi, the choreographer Mark Morris, and the composer Nico Muhly. Her work can be seen in The Jewish Museum .

Vadis Turner

The strangeness will wear off and I think we will discover the deeper meanings in modern art. - Jackson Pollack

Vadis Turner's work is an intersection where color theory, abstraction, assemblage and feminism meet head on. The artist's innate color sensibilities and energy pay homage to the New York School of Abstract Expressionist and Action painters like Joan Mitchell and Willem De Kooning, by employing broad strokes of color. Through Ms. Turner's exquisite and unique use of materials such as ribbon, clothing, antique quilts, lace and yarn, the artist continues to explore and exploit traditional "feminine" materials and creates a contemporary dialogue as found in the works of artists such as Petah Coyne and Shinique Smith.

Turner states, "During the creation of my marital Dowry and Reception (Permanent Collection, Brooklyn Museum of Art), I became interested in the aesthetic bridges between diverse rites of passage. Elaborate ceremonies honor, idealize and purify the subject as they transition from one life chapter to the next. The subject simultaneously embodies a climax and demise. A new identity is conceived. An old identity dies. In this body of work, elements of ceremonial adornment are partnered with various processes of decay. Satin ribbons and flowers are fixed in a stilled state of destruction and removal inspired by fire or mold. Through consumption and repurposing, each process re-imagines the beauty and energy of change and loss.".

Turner's latest installation creates a delicate balance between sustainable and ephemeral, addressing elements like fire, mold and other forms of decay by combining elements from a proven path and a path less traveled. Together with the known and unknown, Vadis Turner crafts a visual kaleidoscope that draws the viewer into an otherworldly realm of aesthetics and beauty.

Vadis Turner earned her MFA and BFA from Boston University. Her work was recently included in New Acquisitions, Brooklyn Museum, Brooklyn, NY and Common Jive, Elizabeth Foundation for the Arts, New York, NY. Her work is in numerous public and private collections

Andrea Dezso

I just discovered Andrea Dezso and her fascinating series of works - in tunnel books (paper), strange embroidery, animation, sculpture, drawings, painted journals and sketchbooks. But despite the variation on the medium, there is a wonderful, surrealistic consistency through all her efforts. She creates a new world, not unlike Joseph Cornell, where body parts, girls with moss and mother's sayings from her Transylvania childhood all come into play.

 

Romanian-born Andrea Dezsö, a visual artist and writer, has taught tunnel book workshops at venues including the Cooper Hewitt National Design Museum in New York City and The Museum of Visionary Art in Baltimore, MD. For Slash: Paper Under The Knife, Andrea created an installation consisting of 30 one-of-a-kind tunnel books. Examples of Andrea Dezsö's tunnel books and other work can be seen on her website at www.andreadezso.com.

Andrea Dezsö earned her BFA and MAFA in visual communication at the Hungarian University of Design in Budapest. Following a year of teaching at her alma mater, Dezsö moved to New York, where she exhibited her work in galleries and held teaching positions at Parsons School of Design and the City University of New York. In addition ot solo exhibitions in the United States, Europe, and Japan, She has participated in numerous group exhibitions. Her public art projects are found in Budapest and in the New York subway at the Bedford Park Boulevard-Lehman College Station. Dezsö’s illustrations have appeared in The New York Times, Harper’s Magazine, Time Magazine, Mc Sweeney’s and others. Currently, she is assistant professor of media design at Parsons The New School for Design in New York.

Matthew Cox

Matthew Cox is an astonishingly versatile artist whose current repertoire includes oil painting, drawings created through stamping on paper and embroidery on x-ray film. I like his playfullness and his "low-brow" art approach.

As his press release says - In his search for alternative drawing materials, Cox utilizes subject specific rubber stamps as his drawing tool. Rubber stamps have become part of his lexicon and his renderings capture the essence of the subject in both words and precise portraiture. Embroidered X-Rays are Cox’s latest discovery… literally hand stitching the X-Rays, bringing them to life and resurrecting the subject from the material. Cox’s multifarious bodies of work strengthen one another by balancing technical and conceptual concerns with humor and formal beauty.

Check out his work at the Hard Times Mini Mall

Deborah Rustin Cyr

 
Deborah Rustin Cyr had a tumultuous early adolescence, like the most of us. She was driven to photography and creative sewing and has been honing these skills for 40 years.

Cyr grew up in a small town of northern New England with a storytelling father and a raucously funny, creative mother and if she wasn’t making something she was making something up.
Today Cyr finds her inspiration in a diverse range of places, from New York’s Chinatown, to the back pages of gay-wear catalogues, to family photo albums and even to grandmother’s closet. Her raw materials are both original “found” pieces of cloth and fabrics that she prints herself using digitally manipulated photographs and illustrations.

These are cut, refigured and stitched until characters appear. Opposites are combined, characters are put into unfamiliar settings and scale is varied for no apparent reason. The end result is both funny and poignant.

Artist Statement

I pull my characters from the culture at large, my family and childhood, and from my dreams, waking and sleeping.

Life means fabric and color, creating tension in my work as I combine opposites, putting familiar images in unfamiliar settings, or on unexpected bodies, and varying scale for no apparent good reason.

Though some of my themes are quite dark I try to infuse even these with a touch of irreverent humor. It amuses me to take a traditional woman’s craft technique, sewing, and use it to make contemporary art.

I am honoured to take my place in the long line of women who have expressed themselves with thread.