This Spring in Connecticut brings an abundance of daffodils and in the US and abroad a slew of art exhibitions. From Scotland to San Francisco to Seoul, we’ve rounded up some suggestions for you:
Jane Balsgaard
April 6 – May 5, 2024
Vejle Kunstforening
Søndermarksvaj 1
Vejle, Denmark 7100
https://www.vejlekunstforeningmoellen.dk/
![Jane Balsgaard paper and glass boat](https://arttextstyle.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/Balsgaard-glass-boat-810.jpg)
This exhibition of Jane Balsgaard’s art work of glass twigs and plant paper will open in Velje, Denmark this April.
Four Stories of Swedish Textile: Inger Bergstöm, Jin Sook So, Katka Beckham Ojala, Takao Momijama
March 20 – April 2, 2024
Suaenyo 339,
339 Pyeongchang-gil, Jongno-gu
Seoul, Korea
http://sueno339.com/?ckattempt=1
![Jin Sook Blue Wall painting](https://arttextstyle.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/Jin-Sook-So-Blue-wall-work.jpg)
This is an exhibition of four very different art practices, including work in stainless steel mesh by Jin-Sook So. “Using textiles as an artistic medium opens up a world of possibilities, interpretations and expectations,” write the exhibition’s curators. “How the individual artist works in this realm is unpredictable and can lead to totally different genres and contexts. The exhibition, 4T – Four Swedish Stories of Textile, shows the works of a group of artists who despite their different expressions are united by an interest specifically for textile surfaces.”
Andy Warhol: The Textiles
Through May 18, 2024
Dovecot Studios
10 Infirmary Street
Edinburgh, SCOTLAND EH1 1LT
https://dovecotstudios.com/whats-on/andy-warhol-the-textiles
![Andy Warhol Textiles](https://arttextstyle.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/Andy-Warhol-Artworks-©-2024-The-Andy-Warhol-Foundation-for-the-Visual-Arts-Inc.-Licensed-by-DACS-London.-3.jpg)
Andy Warhol: The Textiles takes viewers on a journey through the unknown and unrecorded world of designs by the influential artist before his Silver Factory days. As the originators explain, by showcasing over 35 of Warhol’s textile patterns from the period, depicting an array of colorful objects; ice cream sundaes, delicious toffee apples, colorful buttons, cut lemons, pretzels, and jumping clowns, this exhibition demonstrates how textile and fashion design was a crucial stage in Warhol becoming one of the most iconic artists of the 20th century. A book accompanies the exhibition: Warhol: The Textiles.
Irresistible: The Global Patterns of Ikat
Through June 1, 2024
George Washington University and Textile Museum
701 21st St. NW
Washington, DC 20052
museuminfo@gwu.edu
![Irresistible Americas installation](https://arttextstyle.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/Irresistible_Americas_Kacey-Chapman-810.jpg)
Prized worldwide for producing vivid patterns and colors, the ancient resist-dyeing technique of ikat developed independently in communities across Asia, Africa and the Americas, where it continues to inspire artists and designers today. This exhibition explores the global phenomenon of ikat textiles through more than 70 masterful examples — ancient and contemporary — from countries as diverse as Japan, Indonesia, India, Uzbekistan, Côte d’Ivoire and Guatemala. Included are works by Polly Barton, Isabel Toledo, and Ed Rossbach.
Weaving Abstraction in Ancient and Modern Art
Through June 16, 2024
Metropolitan Museum of Art
1000 Fifth Avenue
New York, NY 10028
https://www.metmuseum.org/exhibitions/weaving-abstraction-in-ancient-and-modern-art
![Lenore Tawney in the Center of MET exhibit](https://arttextstyle.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/DP-31951-011-JPG.jpg)
© The Metropolitan Museum of Art, photo by Hyla Skopitz
The process of creating textiles has long been a springboard for artistic invention. In Weaving Abstraction in Ancient and Modern Art, two extraordinary bodies of work separated by at least 500 years are brought together to explore the striking connections between artists of the ancient Andes and those of the 20th century. The exhibition displays textiles by four distinguished modern practitioners—Anni Albers, Sheila Hicks, Lenore Tawney, and Olga de Amaral—alongside pieces by Andean artists from the first millennium BCE to the 16th century.
On and Off the Loom: Kay Sekimachi and 20th Century Fiber Art
Lecture and Video with Melissa Leventon and Ellin Klor
April 20. 2024
1 p.m. EDT
de Young Museum
50 Hagiwara Tea Garden Drive
Golden Gate Park
San Francisco, CA 94118
https://www.textileartscouncil.org/post/on-and-off-the-loom-kay-sekimachi-and-20th-century-fiber-art
![Kay Sekimachi Kiri Wood Paper Vessel](https://arttextstyle.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/31ks-Kiri-1-4-1992.jpg)
Kay Sekimachi is esteemed as an innovator in contemporary fiber art. Her vision has had an impact on many outstanding artists. Sekimachi came of age at a boom time for fiber art, when many artists were experimenting with dimensional weaving both on and off the loom and were challenging old art world hierarchies in the process. In this talk in person and on Zoom, Melissa Leventon will discuss Sekimachi’s oeuvre within the wider context of fiber art in the 20th century.
Woven Histories: Textiles and Modern Abstraction
Through July 28, 2024
National Art Gallery
East Building, Concourse Galleries
4th Street and Constitution Avenue, NW
Washington, DC
https://www.nga.gov/exhibitions/2024/woven-histories-textiles-modern-abstraction.html
![Ed Rossbach Weaving and basket](https://arttextstyle.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/LACMA-Rossbachs.jpg)
This transformative exhibition has moved from the Los Angeles County Museum of Art to the National Gallery in DC. It explores how abstract art and woven textiles have intertwined over the past hundred years.This transformative exhibition explores how abstract art and woven textiles have intertwined over the past hundred years. In the 20th century, textiles have often been considered lesser—as applied art, women’s work, or domestic craft. Woven Histories challenges the hierarchies that often separate textiles from fine arts. Putting into dialogue some 160 works by more than 50 creators from across generations and continents, including Katherine Westphal, Dorothy Gill Barnes, and Ed Rossbach, this exhibition explores the contributions of weaving and related techniques to abstraction, modernism’s preeminent art form. The book that accompanies the exhibition, Woven Histories: Textiles and Modern Abstraction, can be found on our website.
The Resurgence of Interest in Fiber Sculpture and Art Textiles Will Continue in 2015
Last year was an extraordinary one for those of us who appreciate contemporary art fiber and art textiles. More than 10 exhibitions opened in the US and abroad. In October, the art newspaper reported that “textiles are gaining international stature in art museums” and further that “[c]ommercial interest is on the rise,” quoting art advisor Emily Tsingou: “Textile [art] has entered the mainstream.” Soft Fabrics-Have Solid Appeal. Below is a roundup of exhibitions and reviews from last year and a guide to what to expect in 2015.
Mainstream attention began with the coverage of Sheila Hicks‘ inclusion
Sheila Hicks, Pillar of Inquiry/Supple Column, 2013-14 (installation view, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York). Photograph by Bill Orcutt
in the Whitney Biennial in March and was followed by coverage of the restoration of her remarkable 1960s tapestries at the Ford Foundation in New York Sheila Hicks Tapestries to Again Hang at Ford Foundation. In June, the Art Institute of Chicago’s textile galleries reopened, featuring 96-year-old Ethel Stein’s work, in Ethel Stein, Master Weaver.![art institute of Chicago logo](https://arttextstyle.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/art-institute-of-Chicago-logo.jpg)
September saw three fiber-related exhibitions; the Museum of Arts and Design opened What Would Mrs. Webb Do? A Founder’s Vision (closes
February 8, 2015),Kay Sekimachi, Ed Rossbach, Françoise Grossen, Katherine Westphal and others Museum of Art Design installation of What Would Mrs Webb Do?, Photo by Tom grotta
February 8, 2015), which featured significant textiles from the permanent collection by Anni Albers, Kay Sekimachi, Katherine Westphal, Ed Rossbach, Françoise Grossen and Trude Guermonprez, while The Drawing Center’s: Thread-Lines offered Anne Wilson creating fiber art in situ
Ann Wilson’s In Situ Performance at the Drawing Center, photo by Tom Grotta
together with a collection of works by Lenore Tawney, Louise Bourgeois and others. Contemporary 108 in Tulsa, Oklahoma, featured a series of large photographic weavings by Aleksandra Stoyanov of the Ukraine
Contemporary 108 in Tulsa, Oklahoma, curated from the 2013 “Aleksandra Stoyanov” Tefen Open Museum, Israel exhibition. photo copyright Tefen Open Museum
and now Israel, described as “warp and weft paintings.”
In October, Fiber: Sculpture 1960 – present, opened at the Institute of Contemporary Art in Boston with works by 34 artists including
Fiber: Sculpture 1960 — present opening, photo by Tom Grotta
Magdalena Abakanowicz, Ritzi Jacobi and Naomi Kobayashi. The Boston Globe called the exhibition “[s]plendid, viscerally engaging…groundbreaking;” the exhibition catalog (available at browngrotta.com) was pronounced by Blouin art info, “an amazing resource for anyone interested in learning more about the medium.” Art Info – Art in the Air Fiber Sculpture 1960 Present October also saw a survey of the work of sculptor and poet, Richard Tuttle, at the Tate in London, Richard Tuttle:![tuttle.tate.modern](https://arttextstyle.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/tuttle.tate_.modern.jpg)
I Don’t Know, Or The Weave of Textile Language in which Tuttle investigated the importance of textiles throughout history, across his remarkable body of work and into the latest developments in his practice. Tate Modern – Richard Tuttle I Don’t Know or Weave Textile Language
Throughout the year, Innovators and Legends, with work by 50 fiber
![Innovators.Legends](https://arttextstyle.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/Innovators.Legends.jpg)
artists, including Adela Akers, Nick Cave, Katherine Westphal and Sherri Smith toured the US, exhibiting at museums in Colorado, Iowa and Kentucky. The fiber fanfest culminated at Art Basel in Miami Beach in December, where Blouin’s Art Info identified a full complement of fiber works and textiles in its listing, “Definitive Top 11 Booths, “ including Alexandra da Cunha’s compositions of mass-produced beach towels and various colored fabrics at Thomas Dane Gallery, a Rosemarie Trockel embroidered work at Galerie 1900-2000, marble and dyed-fabric pieces by Sam Moyer at Galerie Rodolphe Janssen and woven paintings by Brent Wadden at Mitchell-Innes & Nash Blouin Art info – The Definitive Top-11 Booths at Art Basel Miami Beach.
And what’s ahead in 2015?
More auctions and exhibitions that include fiber sculpture and art textiles are scheduled for 2015. Fiber: Sculpture 1960 – present will
open at the Wexner Center for the Arts, Columbus, Ohio on February 7th and travel to the Des Moines Art Center, Iowa in May.
Sonia Delaunay Prismes electriques 1914 Centre Pompidou Collection, Mnam / Cci, Paris © Pracusa 2013057
dedicated her life to experimenting with color and abstraction, bringing her ideas off the canvas and into the world through tapestry, textiles, mosaic and fashion.
Also in April, the Museum of Arts and Design will host Pathmakers:
Lenore Tawney in her Coenties Slip studio, New York, 1958.
Courtesy of Lenore G. Tawney Foundation; Photo by David Attie
Women in Art, Craft and Design, Midcentury and Today, featuring work by Sheila Hicks, Lenore Tawney and Dorothy Liebes http://madmuseum.org/exhibition/pathmakers.
In June, the Toms Pauli Foundation in Lausanne, Switzerland will celebrate the International Tapestry Biennials held there from 1962 to
1995 and display work by the Polish textile artist and sculptor Magdalena Abakanowicz, in an exhibition entitled, Objective Station.
Also this summer, the Musée d’Art Contemporain de Baie St Paul in![Musée.d'Art.ContemporaindeBaie.StPaul](https://arttextstyle.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/Musée.dArt_.ContemporaindeBaie.StPaul.jpg)
Mariette Rousseau Vermette Portrait by Tom Grotta
Quebec, Canada will examine the work of Mariette Rousseau-Vermette, who participated in five of the Lausanne Biennials.
From April 24 – May 3, 2015, browngrotta arts will host Influence and Evolution, Fiber Sculpture then and now at our barn/home/gallery space in Wilton, Connecticut. In its 27-year history, browngrotta arts
Françoise Grossen, From the Mermaid Series IV, 1983, photo by Tom Grotta
including Magdalena Abakanowicz, Lia Cook, Kay Sekimachi and Françoise Grossen, with works from a later generation of artists, all born after 1960, through whom fiber sculpture continues to evolve. These artists, including María Eugenia Dávila and Eduardo Portillo of Venezuela, Stéphanie Jacques of Belgium and Naoko Serino of Japan, work in a time when classification of medium and material presents less of a constraint and fiber and fiber techniques can be more readily explored for their expressive potential alone.
“It is rare to find so many inventive, compelling works in one show, and it astounds that many are so little known,” wrote Kirsten Swenson in Art in America, about Fiber: Sculpture 1960 – present, in October 2014. Art in America Magazine – reviews: Fiber Sculpture 1960-present. This spring, in Influence and Evolution, browngrotta arts will offer dozens more significant works of fiber art for collectors to appreciate and new audiences to discover — more than two dozen works by fiber pioneers and another 30 more recent fiber explorations. We hope you will visit the exhibition, order the catalog or both. Please contact us for more information about what’s in store. art@browngrotta.com