Unconformities

An Exploration in Layers and Time
Fiber Art by Julia March Crocetto
October 7 – November 4

This body of work was inspired by the unconformities and peculiar formations of the Colorado Plateau, reflections on geologic time vs. human time, experiences of socio-political turmoil, the forces at work in shaping them, and my emotional responses to the anomalies witnessed. My ongoing inquiries revolve around the contemplation of place and layers of memories, expressed with mark-making through painting, printmaking, and stitching. Through wrapping, collecting, and mapping, I create tangible, meaningful connections with place, embracing the perceived futility of harnessing the intangible. In this work I have layered my thoughts of loss, grief, beauty, and joy which are stratified and eroded through processes of stitching, unstitching, and re-stitching. My work is influenced by living in the Greater West and witnessing our fraught relationship with wilderness and wildness. I am curious about the overlap of systems, points of friction, adaptation, and cooperation, and seek the poetic conversations that can be found there. My practice leverages process and alchemy to imbue the work with the complexity I encounter and experience.

Employing creative mapping, I layer found materials, impressions recorded on location, scientific data, and actions such as tracing, collecting, wrapping, binding, stitching, and unstitching. Mental states of solastalgia (pain related to loss of home/place), topophilia (love of place and landscape), and biophilia (love of nature) are parts of the equation. By using aerial views, satellite imagery, and cross-sections, I attempt to recalibrate my perspective. In this data I find facts and poetry, unmistakable traces of humankind and beautiful abstractions of truth. Meshing macro with micro, I integrate these tangible attributes with my field notes and memories, attempting to articulate intangible aspects of place through incubation, hand work, and alchemical interactions with materials. Akin to dealing with grief, these “slow” processes cannot be accelerated. The resulting artifacts, which have been drawn, printed, stitched, folded, buried, neglected, rusted, painted and/or dyed may be seen as maps, journals, or objects of contemplation; image and object become intertwined. Textiles have a history of carrying narratives; the quilt is the iconic storyteller of the West. I embrace the quilt for its oscillation between image and object, and fiber as a medium because of its response to my techniques and for its intimate relationship with humans.

Image: Julia March Crocetto, Crossbedding VII