Cloth as a Memory Object
In the bronze casting series, the process begins through constructing the cloth on a floor loom, then evolves with using an ancient technique of lost wax casting, and becomes a shell of what was once held; only to be transformed into something permanent —a bronze object. It is later dyed using water, heat, and a mineral patina.
At first glance of the woven work, it’s hard to see these pieces as fully bronze, but the cloth has burned away.
Sometimes I consider these objects as cremated or petrified moments in time. Moments much like fragments where pieces of the cloth have been forever burned away, leaving behind translucency or negative space, and never restored by the bronze pour. Moments that remind me that these connections tied to cloth thread considerations of which gestures we take time to commemorate: for ourselves or for others. It comes into question which stories are being carefully preserved before being passed along, and which narratives will become worn away through the passage of time, much like a well loved garment that has been noticeably mended and worn thin.
In the bronze series, Cloth as a Memory Object, constitutes that even decay is a form of transformation, that there is continuity out of fragments, and that an unbreakable narrative thread can serve as a connection to purpose and meaning.