Flour, Ghee, Sesame Seeds, 2023. Cotton and Synthetic Hair, 70 x 20 x 20 in.
“Along with cave paintings, threads were among the first transmitters of meaning” wrote Anni Albers in On Weaving. Even so, for most of contemporary art history, textile arts been categorized and dismissed as craft. Over the last few decades, the process of bridging this long-implied gap between mediums has been pioneered by artists outside of the Western art world.
Today, as the contemporary art world continues to witness an increased presence of textile arts, the supposed dichotomy between “craft” and “art” is both challenged and examined. The hierarchies which placed fabric beneath the paintbrush have often been motivated by cultural, gendered, and regional biases, and with every stitch, the artists in this show engage with their own experiences, losses, and histories at the hands of the same prejudices.
Textile arts, historically, were as much a tool of storytelling as they were practical. Like the tapestries of Raphael, recounting scenes from the Gospels stitch by stitch on a massive scale, or like a great-great-grandmother’s quilt passed down generation to generation, each square holding family heritage that may have otherwise been forgotten, the histories that precede us—on ancestral, cultural, and regional scales—are as intrinsic to each textile as the thread they are born of.
Despite both the skill and artistry required of textile work, until contemporary movements, textiles have rarely been regarded as more than “craft”—both as a result of the pervasive necessity of textiles, from the clothes we wear to the sheets we sleep on, as well as the historical social implication of allowing a field pioneered by both women and the global south to be deemed “art.” As a result, the labor has gone mostly unrecognized and unacknowledged.
The artists in With every fiber challenge the outdated notions that have relegated textile work to a backseat view of the art world and disassemble the politics that placed it there. Through repurposing cultural fabrics, weaving empathetic organic figures, or encompassing self-portraits with stitching, they step away from both traditional practices and traditional lines of thinking.
With every fiber presents textiles as both a tangible manifestation of labor and an extension of the canvas, while examining how even with this contemporary shift away from convention, the narrative thread is imbued in every stitch, as much purposeful as it is unintentional—for each one carries the weight of the huge cultural histories that precede it.
Negin Mahzoun, What the Eye Sees, the Hurt Remembers from Needle's Song Project, 2024. Photography and textile, linen fabric, black thread, wood black frame, 60h x 60w in.
Haffendi Anuar (b. 1985, Malaysia) examines the anatomy of postcolonial identity, using the iconography of the kain pelikat as his primary tool. Deconstructing and reworking these articles of clothing into textile pieces encourages new understandings of their cultural significance. His pieces are much a depiction of his own memories of the garments as they are evocative of larger cultural associations. Haffendi received a BFA at Rhode Island School of Design in Providence, and completed an undergraduate degree in Fine Art at Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design in London, as well as an MFA at the Ruskin School of Art, Oxford University, Oxford. His work has been exhibited worldwide, including in New York, Italy, Singapore, and Taiwan. Anuar lives and works between London, UK and Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
Nuveen Barwari’s (b. Nashville) work transcends that of just one medium. Through experimenting with the relationship between textiles, collage, painting, and installation, she is able to similarly investigate the intersections of overlapping, conflicting cultures. Her textiles are as dynamic and fluid as language, creating what she sees an act of resistance as she repurposes fabric materials from her Kurdish community to reimagine cultural and political borders and highlight the incongruities of a diasporic identity. Barwari received an MFA from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville in 2022 and her B.S in Art from Tennessee State University in 2019. Barwari currently lives in Albany, NY.
Shobha Broota’s (b. 1943, India) approach to textile-making exhibits the same focused discipline as her paintings, imbuing each woven piece with a sense of meditative purity. Her works reflect an undeniable mastery, using artistic fundamentals to contemplate the harmonies that shape our understanding of reality. Broota received a degree in Fine Arts from College of Art, Delhi and has been teaching art since 1964. She lives and works in New Delhi, India.
Ruby Chishti (b. 1963, Pakistan) works most frequently with unconventional mediums—her textiles are comprised of discarded fabric waste, from secondhand ceremonial wear to thrifted denim. She uses these materials to communicate—with visual urgency—themes of the ephemerality of memory, love and loss as an intrinsic element of human existence, and the sociopolitical consequences of cultural trauma. Chishti received a BFA at the National College of Arts in Lahore; she additionally trained in sculpture at El Dorado Center in Placerville and bronze casting at Art Foundry Gallery in Sacramento. She lives and works in Brooklyn, NY.
Sarah Farid (b. Oman, 1984) uses textile as a way to honor her cultural heritage and to share it with the world. Using traditional Omani fabrics and patterns–even weaving in Omani herbs and spices like frankincense–she pays homage to her ancestry and her homeland. Layering different mediums, often combining practices that are both contemporary and traditional, she adds levels of reflection to each piece. Farid earned her BA in Marketing from the American University in Dubai and is the founder of Cure8 Art Gallery in Muscat. She was selected to represent the Omani pavilion at the Venice Biennale in 2024. She lives and works in Oman.
Alice Kettle (b. 1961, UK) is considered a pioneer in her art form. Building upon the historical tradition of textile storytelling and often working on a massive scale, her work floats between literary allusions, global events, and the artist’s lived experiences. As a result, human emotions are constantly at play in her pieces, both as a depiction and within every single stitch. Comprised of both traditional elements and contemporary practices, her pieces inspire personal introspection and cultural reflection. Kettle is a Professor of Textile Arts at the Manchester School of Art, Manchester Metropolitan University. Her work is held in 23 international public collections and has been exhibited worldwide. Kettle lives and works in the UK.
Shradha Kochhar (b. India) weaves together, simultaneously, the narratives of women’s work and of south asian heritage. Her sculptures are hand knitted of kala cotton, a strain of cotton native to India, which emphasizes her exploration of material memory on both personal and cultural scales. As she creates a physical archive of these narratives through her textiles, she is able to transform her practice into a process of intergenerational healing. Kochhar received her MFA in Textiles from Parsons School of Design in New York and was awarded the John L. Tishman Environment and Design Award for Excellence in 2021. Her work has been featured in Vogue, the New York Times, and Paper magazine. She lives and works in New York.
Negin Mahzoun (b. Iran) regards textiles as an act of remembrance. Through her work, she is able to give form to oppression, using her sewing practices to engage with social and cultural trauma. Stitching over her self-portraits mirrors the self-destructive tendencies that often accompany trauma, allowing her pieces to become both a visual metaphor for that suffering, as well as a path to healing. Negin received her MFA in Studio Art from the City College of New York. Her works have been exhibited worldwide, including in Paris, New York, Italy, Denmark, and Iran. Mahzoun lives and works in New York.
Ruth Marbun (b.1985, Indonesia) uses embroidery to flip the medium’s traditional associations of femininity and perfection on their head, instead choosing to indulge in the uniqueness and imperfection of each stitch. Her work transforms textile into a fluid, lively medium that reflects the energy and emotions of the hand that made them, reshaping the relationship between textile-making and women’s stories. Marbun receive her Bachelor’s Degree in Fashion Design from Raffles Design Institute in Singapore and has been exhibited in New York, Sydney, Jakarta, Tokyo, and Malaysia. She lives and works in Jakarta.
Mohsin Shafi’s (b. 1982, Pakistan) works investigate the intersecting structures of gender, sexuality, religion, and ideology and the ways in which these categories are both affected by and perpetuators of systemic societal violence. His process of sublimation printing on cultural textiles allows for the physical visualization of how these structures overlap, emblematic of the reality of identity as layered, multifaceted, and rarely conforming. Shafi earned his Bachelors in Visual Communication (2008) and his Masters in Visual Arts (2011) from the National College of Arts, Lahore, Pakistan. Shafi’s work is held in prominent collections in Pakistan and has been shown worldwide. Shafi lives and works in Lahore.
Abdullah M.I. Syed (b. 1974, Pakistan) reimagines currencies as an artistic medium, weaving US dollar bills or Indian rupees together into a new kind of fabric. He comments on the Western and capitalist understandings of economic ownership and power, rooted in colonial ideologies. As he weaves his found fabrics, so are weaved art and political commentary. Syed holds a PhD in Art, Media and Design (2015) and a Master of Fine Arts (2009) from University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia, as well as a Bachelor of Art in Design (1999) and a Master of Education (2001) from the University of Central Oklahoma (UCO), Edmond, Oklahoma, USA.