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GAIL MARTIN GALLERY POLLY BARTON:
Woven Explorations April 24 – May
10, 2008 In her first solo exhibition in New York since 2000 Polly Barton has created an exciting body of work. Evoking the richness of color-field paintings Barton’s work with its extraordinary color effects and exquisite detail brings a new meaning to the concept of painting. Instead of pigments she uses techniques of dyeing and weaving to create completely original, striking visual effects that are impossible to achieve in other mediums. Although she continues her relationship with the resist dying technique of ikat, she has gone in exhilarating new directions by adding the eccentric weft technique of weaving, sumi ink dying and the use of metallic threads to create woven drawings. Blending personal feelings, craftsmanship, and intuition, her new work brilliantly showcases the breath of her skill at creating paintings with dye, thread and ink. Her works are infused with very private emotions which combined with events in her life and the places she has lived guide her imagery. This show offers pieces with colors ranging from brilliant oranges to somber grays and all the colors in between and many also with glittering silver threads, ranging in size from a group of pieces only 8" X 8" each to the largest at 5 feet by 7 ½ feet. Jack Lenor Larsen, the most widely recognized fiber art expert in America says, "Perhaps no other artist in the West has employed ikat patterning so richly as Polly Barton. The washes of color so achieved are phenomenal." BACKGROUND INFORMATION Barton brings the art of ikat-making to an entirely new level by using extra fine warp (vertical) and weft (horizontal) threads of silk and dyeing them in difficult-to-handle, very small bundles to achieve a very high pattern resolution and a fluid, curvilinear design. The works are created by ikat (resist) dying of the warp and weft threads before being woven into ‘paintings’ that feature extraordinary color effects and exquisite detail that is only possible to achieve through the technique of ikat dying. In addition to ikat dyeing, she also ‘paints’ washes of (diluted) dye onto the ikat dyed warp already placed on the loom in preparation for weaving. Polly says, "My gesture as an artist is tied to the expressive nature of ikat. It is the saturated stain and resist of dye to silk thread, the elegant simplicity of the shift of one color next to another and the authority of the grid where I find pleasure in my woven paintings…In tying knot after knot, I must balance my artistic desire and the technique’s own expressive potential….and when the lustrous silk threads of ikat are released, they speak with a voice that never ceases to surprise me." Most recently she has been using a new Japanese thread of viscose coated rayon which takes sumi ink (vermillion and black) very well and she has also introduced metallic threads into her works. In addition she began altering the weaving of the weft threads so that during the weaving process, instead of just placing them in the normal straight line horizontal manner, she pushes them up and down; stretching the warp with what are called eccentric wefts. This technique creates a seemingly three dimensional effect and in some pieces the surface actually is no longer flat and the eccentric wefts appear as ‘waves’ rising from the surface. According to Polly, "With eccentric weft, I use the thread in its soft and malleable form to build the textile membrane stretching the structure of the warp." Most recently she writes, "The eccentric weft textiles are sculptural drawings. Drawing with a fine silk thread on the loom in a textile is slow and contemplative, building thread by thread one area of the woven design at a time." Historically, traditional ikats are textiles whose designs are produced as a result of the resist dyeing of the warp and/or weft threads before they are woven. First the threads are grouped into bundles, then sections are wrapped tightly with other thread and dipped into vats of dye. Sections which have been wrapped do not receive the dye. This procedure is repeated for each additional color. It is an extremely labor-intensive, time consuming and complex procedure, sometimes taking up to several months to complete and is one of the most rare techniques used in the art world to produce incomparable visual effects. Ikat dying has a rich cultural history and it continues to evolve with an extraordinary artist like Polly Barton. ARTIST STATEMENT In weaving, the warp is the vertical plane of resistance, representing a chosen path as do the blank canvas, the empty page, and the sculptor’s block. The weft is the horizontal element, the hand and will of the artist. Together, the woven threads mark the progress of time. POLLY BARTON PRESS CONTACT: Gail Martin
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Gail Martin Gallery, ancient, antique, ethnographic, textiles, contemporary fiber art, GAIL MARTIN GALLERY, ANCIENT, ANTIQUE, ETHNOGRAPHIC, TEXTILES, CONTEMPORARY FIBER ART. Gail martin galler
y, ancient, antique, ethnographic, textiles, contemporary fiber art, Gail Martin Gallery, ancient, antique, ethnographic, textiles, contemporary fiber art. Gail Martin Gallery, ancient, antique, ethnographic, textiles, contemporary fiber art, GAIL MARTIN GALLERY, ANCIENT, ANTIQUE, ETHNOGRAPHIC, TEXTILES, CONTEMPORARY FIBER ART. Gail martin gallery, ancient, antique, ethnographic, textiles, contemporary fiber art, Gail Martin Gallery, ancient, antique, ethnographic, textiles, contemporary fiber art.