I hosted an adult artist workshop with Dallas Contemporary to complement Margarita Cabrera’s exhibition It is Impossible to Cover the Sun with a Finger. Margarita sources boarder patrol uniforms from thrift stores in protest of harsh immigration laws and treatment. She then engages garment factory workers, some of whom may be illegal immigrants from Latin America, to embroider their hopes, dreams, and life stories onto the uniforms. The artist then sews the uniforms into various cacti species chosen by the garment workers making a garden of soft sculptures.
Dallas Contemporary, Design District, Dallas, March 6th 6:00-9:00pm
The Director of Education asked me to craft a hands-on activity based on these themes. In my Place Mat series, I use my own old clothes, often sourced from thrift stores, and recreate mixed media textile art that forms a conceptual self-portrait. I created an activity involving embroidery using orchids and orchid bud templates that I drew myself. The orchid’s vulnerable and lady like structure was a contrast to Margarita’s masculine and militant cacti. I brought books from the library that indexed orchids from around the world. I also included text as an embroidery template that based on starting a conversation with someone else.
Dallas Contemporary exterior
