Edith is installing Dyed, a riff/revision/remix of a project she originally did at the Arroyo Arts Collective in Highland Park, what seems like a forever ago, at Scout, a boutique at 3rd and Fairfax on the Westside. The piece will go on view at a party this coming Friday night (7-10 PM), celebrating the new Scout collection and collaborations with Tsurukichi, a Japanese traditional indigo dyeing house. The previous incarnation was constructed from donated clothing, and this one is being constructed from a selection of dyed-black clothing, all cast away and in some state of abandonment, unwantedness or failure.
I stopped by yesterday afternoon to lend a hand setting up the warps for the woven structure that Edith is creating in the space, a task made slightly tricky by the absence of a few more inches of height on either Edith’s or my part. Onward to the photos. Short Flickr set here with more.
Above - I love taking pictures of people tying knots. It’s a hard subject, since there’s a sort of uncoordinated and instinctive motion going on. You get a weird combination of motion blur and focus. I’m not sure any of my knot tying photos are any good yet, but I’ll get there eventually. I got a bunch of knot tying photos yesterday, there are four more in the set. Here Edith is tying the loop that attaches each piece to the supporting hook on the ceiling.
Above - Edith standing on a ladder, getting ready to loop one of the warp ends of the weaving onto its hook. This was tricky in some places and easy in others, and it did involve standing on the tippy-top of the A-frame ladder we were using. Luckily, we were able to compensate for our mutual lack of height by using one of those long hooks that you use to retrieve hangers and clothing from high places, which Scout conveniently had around.
Above - Joey Grana, owner of Scout, our ladder hero, arriving with a taller ladder, to make our lives better, easier and more productive.
Above - The warp portion of Dyed completed, and the weft begun. The whole thing will be filled in with woven strips of tied together dyed-black clothing. Tying together the clothing was like digging through the back of some goth girl’s closet. The clothing gets tied together haphazardly into long ropes and then woven through. Based upon this project’s mechanics, Edith is a good roomie to have if you’re ever imprisoned in a high place and have a ready supply of laundry to make an escape with. Maybe this whole project is training for said escape…
Technorati Tags: Scout, Joey Grana, Edith Abeyta, Dyed, installation art, installation, process, documentation is everything, fiber art, tying a knot, tying, Tsurukichi, art, LA Art
