[ Golden Gater Online - September 18, 1997 ]
Franciscan vestments, 19th century basketry and the AIDS quilt will be among the items displayed at a fiber arts exhibit which opens on campus this weekend.
"The Fabric of Life: 150 Years of Northern California Fiber Art History," focuses on the individual artist who uses textiles as a means of expression and opens this Sunday at SF State Art Department Gallery. The exhibition, the first ever to document significant northern California fiber and textile art achievements, features about 70 pieces borrowed from collectors, artists and local galleries.
Among the biggest contributors are the M.H. de Young Memorial Museum in San Francisco and the Oakland Museum, who alone have loaned 25 fiber art exhibits that range in size from small Arts and Crafts Era fabrics to Contemporary large scale installation work.
"The exhibition documents 150 years of textile history in northern California, starting with pre-contact Native American work and coming up to the present," said Candace Crockett, SF State art instructor and event curator.
Textiles, or fiber art, which includes basketry and other woven forms of indigenous peoples, are the anchors of the exhibition. The event will also showcase examples of religious vestments from the Mission period in California, quilts from the Gold Rush era, and printed works from the Arts and Crafts period.
"We will feature a lot of artists of diverse ethnicity," gallery director Mark Johnson said. "It is a rare opportunity to see these objects."
The student-produced exhibition will also feature a netted wire sculpture by Ruth Asawa, a ticker tape weaving constructed by Dorothy Liebes in the late '20s and the AIDS quilt.
Many of the artists will be present for the opening reception from 2-4 p.m. on Sunday, Sept. 21 (opening remarks by Crockett at 1:30 p.m.) There will also be a symposium held at the de Young Museum on Oct. 18 in conjunction with the exhibition, and will feature art historians as well as many of the artists. The exhibit runs through Oct. 18. For more information, call the Arts and Industry Gallery at 338-6535.
[ Golden Gater - September 18, 1997 ]