The show will have more than 50 unique art objects for sale under the gallery’s Christmas tree. Two of my original embroidery artworks and a gift pack of my collage notebooks will be wrapped up all pretty under there. š
The gifts will have the name of the artist who made the work on them (so guests can have an idea of what they may be purchasing) but the contents of the gifts will be a surprise.
Every gift is $300 or less and a portion of the proceeds will be donated to Brave Space Alliance in Chicago.
Come in and buy a gift of artwork, hang out, and enjoy baked goods from Gingham Baking and eggnog. What a Saturday! Thereās word Santa might even show upā¦
The gallery will be open Sunday as well so you can still hit up the tree if you canāt make it Saturday. Theyāll have items available on the online shop soon too.
Chicago friends, come see two of my newest pieces in person, plus work from these awesome other artists!
The Fulton Street Collective group show Journey / Explore opens this Friday, December 10, from 7-10 pm. ā
The address is 1821 W. Hubbard St. (on Hubbard between Wolcott and Wood, and NOT on Kinzieā¦ thatāll send you to the alley, and thatās not where the show will be though perhaps thatās a cool idea for next time??)ā
Tickets are $5 and thereās a capacity limit (because š·), so snag yours now!
As the end of the year (aka gift giving season) rolls up with the top down, I thought I’d show off one of my favorite custom embroidery jobs from the archives.
***
I recently finished this custom piece for a dear friend. He wanted to gift an artwork to a friend who loved wrestling and wrestling history. He picked an image from this series of photographs by Irving Penn from 1945 and told me to have at it.
Original image info: Irving Penn, 1945, āDorian Leigh & Maurice Tillet aka The French Angelā
The man in this photo is Maurice Tillet (1903-1954), the most notorious wrestler of the 1940s, better known by his ring name, ~THE FRENCH ANGEL~.
The plaque there tells more of this manās story:
āHe studied 14 languages, wrote poetry, and aspired to become an actor. However, his dreams were shattered when he developed acromegaly in his twenties. ā¦ This disorder is caused by an abnormal production of growth hormone usually related to a benign tumor of the pituitary glandā¦ With his new body, Tillet, an educated man and a lover of the fine arts, felt like a monstrosity. Unable to face a life of constant gawking and humiliation, he decided to make drastic changes and use his condition to his benefit.ā
At the end of his life, Maurice was a Chicago boy. He died here, too, of a heart attack that came on after he heard that his trainer died. <sobbbbbbing>
My color choices for his wings and the stars on his belt are a direct reference to the Chicago flag.
I almost put the fourth star on Maurice’s belt too, but I just had to do something about Dorian there…
The angle of her foot, the shape of that heelā¦ oh la la, thereās just so much I love about that aspect of the original photograph. I put the last star beneath it to give Dorian her own special place in this piece.
New on the shop: It’s that time of year again. Time to think about the next one.
Have your best year yet with my dotted, delicious, designed colorful calendar poster. So full of promises for hope, happiness, and horrible alliterations!
I started learning how to animate my embroidery art recently. Part of my whole ~art as self-authorization~ kick. Here are a few of my favorites so far:
Just kidding. You can put anything in my macro.baby totebags, not just toast.
But, toast in your tote is probably a cool ideaā¦ I mean, everybody loves toast. Youāll be so popular! Pack butter too probably. And jam! If anything spills inside, you can just machine wash it once you get home after hanging out with all your cool new friends who now call you Toad for some reason but you think they mean Toast theyāre just saying it wrong!
ARTISAN TOAST TOTEBAGS
Hand-sewn in the U.S., and Society6 says the print will never fade. These babes are constructed with a premium, canvas-like material and double-stitched for quality.
Available in three sizes
Crafted with durable, lightweight poly poplin fabric
On this day nearly 100 years ago (1927), Isadora Duncan died the strangest death. She was strangled in not-so-nice Nice (France).
By her scarf.
āIsadora Funcanā by Jackie Mantey // Original image info: Arnold Genthe, 1869-1942, āIsadora Duncan: studies.ā
Duncan was a dancer, remarkable for her ability to use the bodyās natural movements and desires as guides for her improvisational choreography. She is remembered for her movement-based rebuke of classical dance and its wealthy connotations at the time. Her dance was independent. Emotional. Beloved by sad corseted ladies and boho-minded men yearning to be free the world over.
Because of this dance style, scarves were kind of her thing.āļø She usually danced barefoot, while wrapped in free-flowing gowns.
I know this sounds kind of āso what?ā in the context of today, a time in which Bonnaroo exists and you canāt walk past a modern dance performance without being thrown a curtain from the rafters to climb into and be swaddled like a baby in the cradle of the womb your subconscious still craves.
But!
At Duncanās time, the drapery was rebellious ā shocking even! Her movement style and sartorial choices were a stark contrast to the toe mashing and waist gashing of classical ballet, the bitchy bell of the dance ball for too long.
Neighborhood baddie, summer pre-COVID
Neighborhood bummer, summer 2021
Hereās what was not her thing: Cars. š Iām being glib, but this part is actually super sad. Duncan had three children (āall out of wedlock,ā Wikipedia notesā¦ hell yeah, Izzy). Weāre already off the rails here, so Iām just going to quote Wikipedia again:
āThe first two [children], Deirdre Beatrice (born 1906), whose father was theatre designer Gordon Craig; and the second, Patrick Augustus (born 1910), by Paris Singer, one of the many sons of sewing machine magnate Isaac Singer, drowned in the care of their nanny in 1913 when their car went into the River Seine.ā
Daaaaamnā¦. š And then:
āIn her autobiography, Duncan relates that [IN HER UNIMAGINABLE GRIEF] she begged a young Italian stranger [HELL YEAH, IZZY], the sculptor Romano Romanelli, to sleep with her because she was desperate for another child. She became pregnant and gave birth to a son on August 13, 1914, but he died shortly after birth. [WTF!]ā
One can not blame Dear Isadora, then, for ignoring the warning of her fellow passenger on that fateful joyride in 1927 to watch her damn scarf.
Why not live free? Look fabulous? Die at 50 in a tragic and grotesquely bizarre way befitting a tragic and beautifully bizarre life? With a burdenous heart broken such as that… then what, pray tell my young man, is a broken neck?
The scarf caressed her as l’automobile revved faster on whatever rue de la franacaise. It slithered silky and sensual out the window, fluttered with the wind and shivered with thrilling joie de vivre. Then, spotting the car’s open-spoked wheels and, being one to fancy danger, the scarf flirted and tickled and teased and then licked the rear axle. The tire, all business of cut-throat rubber and metal grinding dirt, responded and swallowed the tongue of that scarf and consumed it in one harumphing gulp, pulling the legendary body of Isadora Duncan down with it for dessert.
A snap. A slice. An exit wound.
A goodbye, sweet world. A thanks for the dance. āļø
I recently subscribed to The Met on YouTube and found a trove of treasures from this institutional mainstay. Since 2020, the museum has released three to four films from the moving-image archive to celebrate its 150th anniversary. Called āFrom The Vaults,ā the series continues through March 2022.Ā
Hey, when you turn 150 years old, itās your party and you can make everyone celebrate for two years if you want to.
Iām slowly making my way through all the artifacts theyāve posted; most recently, a 1992 film about American painter Ralph Fasanella, who was known for his depictions of working-class city life and born in the Bronx on Labor Day 1914 to newly minted Italian immigrants.
āāBerenice Abbott: āA View of the 20th Centuryā
One of the most compelling docs Iāve watched in The Metās series so far was another 1992 piece, this one about the photographer Berenice Abbott. I LOVE Berenice and am often drawn to her Works Progress Administration images when selecting images for my embroidery collection.
As one source in the film so succinctly put it, Berenice took, āEmotionally resonant pictures of ordinary things.ā Thatās as working class as it comes.
What I didnāt realize was how accomplished Berenice was in other intellectual and theoretical pursuits beyond artmaking. Here are some of my favorite quotes from this legendary artist.
āThis clear-eyed, insightful documentary, directed by Martha Wheelock and Kay Weaver, offers a grand tour of Abbottās extraordinary life, from her youth in Ohio and apprenticeship in Paris through her later groundbreaking scientific photography at MIT and final years in Maine.
Using the artistās memories as a lens for apprehending nearly a century of American and European cultural history,this film pays homage to Abbottās genius for invention, her free-spirited embrace of uncertainty and experience, and her unshakeable devotion the art of photography.ā
Berenice Abbott photographing on South Street, New York, 1937. Photo by Consuelo Kanaga.
ON BEING AN ARTIST
āThe only pleasure you can get from creating something is the pleasure you have in doing it. Not the final product even. The pleasure you have in doing it. And that cannot be taken away from you. And it cannot be crushed. But you had a certain kind of joy creating it. And thatās all you can expect.ā
āThere are many teachers who could ruin you. Before you know it you could be a pale copy of this teacher or that teacher. You have to evolve on your own.ā
āI think you have to be intensely personal and be true to yourself. The subject matter that excites you is something you want to photograph. You have to convey to the person who looks at it what it was that excited you.ā
āTo the Pitā by Jackie Mantey. Embroidery floss on photo paper. // Original image info: Berenice Abbott, 1937, āTriborough Bridge, East 125th Street approach, Manhattan.ā
ON ART
āIf youāre trying to express people, you have to be part of it because itās an exchange. Youāre a part of that time.ā
āThe art is selecting what is worthwhile to take the trouble about.ā
āI think it stands to reason that if you recognize and appreciate your heritage, it helps you with your future.ā
āSocial Distancingā by Jackie Mantey. Embroidery floss on photo paper. // Original image info: Berenice Abbott, 1937, āGeneral view from penthouse, 56 Seventh Avenue, Manhattan.ā
ON PHOTOGRAPHY
āAnything you photograph has to be exciting somehow visually. It has to be photographically important, visually important. Otherwise you write about it.ā
āPhotography is very much a prisoner of its time. You work within the framework of the technique at the time, and thatās the way you have to judge photography.ā
āI think all photography is documentary or it isnāt even photography. Most photographs are documents by their very nature of the realistic image. When they try to make it a nonrealistic image, theyāre imitating another medium. Selectivity is key.ā
āMany interesting things arenāt photogenic at all.ā
ON CITY APPEAL
āIt isnāt just that you think the city is beautiful. Itās that the city is very interesting. Everything in it has been built by man. It expresses people more than people themselves.ā
āThe city is full of every period, every epoch. Everything there comes out of the human gut. Everything thatās built. Every sign thatās put up. The new, the old, the beautiful, the ugly. Itās the juxtaposition of all this that is an intensely, immensely human subject. Youāre photographing people when youāre photographing a city. You donāt have to have a person in it.ā
ON BEING A WOMAN
āHe said, āNice girls donāt go down on the Bowery.ā And I said, āWell, Iām not a nice girl. Iām a photographer.āā
āMy assistant got the job. A young man whom I had trained. I think the last thing the world really wants are independent women. I donāt think they like independent women much. Just why I donāt know. But I donāt care.ā
āYes, Iāve always been a loner. Iām certain that some people marry and it doesnāt spoil their independence, even women in some cases. The vast majority seems to snare the woman and she can lose track of her directions and her desires and her interests. Iāve heard so many women say, āOh I would like to have done this but after all my family came first. I had to look after my sons.ā So apparently that was more important to them. To me it would be like losing yourself. I think your work is the most important thing in your life. To spend more time with it.ā
ON BEING
āI believe in nature and truth and common sense, pursuit of knowledge. Nothing is any good unless you sort of live up to it. Do unto others as you would have done unto you. That is very valid and canāt get you into any trouble. But you donāt need religion to have morals.ā
āI always thought that there was nothing smarter than an old woman. Youāve lived so much, youāve seen so much, in some sense youāve been on the passive end of it, which means that you have observed plenty. But my impression was always that most ordinary women, if theyāre old, have some remarkable quality that no other people have.ā
āI had no idea I was getting older. Iāve never worried about getting older. I donāt see why people make so much of a thing about aging. Itās so natural to age. Everything is aging all the time. Everybodyās aging constantly. Why worry? Itās slow. Youāre not aware of it.You just take it in your stride. But women are so harassed with the idea because of the social attitude, the unfairness of social attitudes between the aging of men and women is so ridiculous and so dreadful that womenās years seem to be only good as long as she can procreate, but a man can be very attractive at 80.ā
These back to school bookbag and notebook combos by macro.baby fit the trendsāand everything else you need them to hold.
The backpacks have a heavy-duty construction, padded nylon backs and bottoms with durable spun poly fabric, and an interior pocket for a laptop. The notebooks are on a high-quality 70-pound paper and feature an anti-scuff laminate cover with a super-soft matte feel.
āDelicateā by Jackie Mantey // Original image info: Dorothea Lange, 1938, āWomen in auto camp for migrant citrus workers. Tulare County, California.ā
Thereās a time and a place to air your dirty laundry. That time is now. That place is my heart, girlfriend! āļø
On our recent trip to New Mexico, I made it all the way to the clouds before realizing I’d forgotten my swimsuit. My old bikini remained rolled up somewhere, seducing moths with its neon thread trim and fading pheromones of summerās past (chlorine, sunscreen, Red Hot French fries).
How does one end up suit-less on a pool-centric vacation? I blame COVID. Itās been a year and a half of never really leaving the apartment. I don’t know how to plan to be out in the world anymore. Iām still getting my sea legs back under me. Pool legs?
We landed in El Paso and saddled up our slick white Mustang to drive to Las Cruces. As I worked from my laptop at the Airbnb weād rented for a few days, Justin drove with the top down to Target and tried to find a swimsuit in my size that was as close to cute as possible.
He came back with this neon orange bikini:
Emergency pool purchase swimsuit.
It’s too big in the bottom. The drawers are droopy. Any time I climb out of a pool, waterfalls pour from the sides. I look like a soggy toddler bopping around in a dragging, dirty diaper.
But who cares. It was a sweet pick. He even snuck a size swap so that the top and bottom are two different sizes. Medium on the top, large on the bottom for my back-country backside.
I guess thatās just what happens when we forget how to do things we used to remember. We improvise. We make do. We jump in feet first. Iām just happy to be here.
