Occasional Labor
Occasional Labor, 16mm film still sequence, 1991
With a handmade broom of pine needles lashed to a fallen branch, she sweeps the shoreline’s edge
into the incoming tide. It is winter. Her gowns are layered, her socks hand knit, her steps are small and measured.
Sand is prima materia. It occurs in the world through vast accumulations of minute particles. Time and the cycle of tides
are circular: a repeating motif, a ripple of water or sand, a gestural turn against the recurrence of unwanted debris.
For the original installation, the
film was projected on a length of lace, suspended in the middle of a small room. The floor was covered with an undulating pattern of white sand. Visitors to the gallery were invited, one at a time, to sit in a muslin covered beach chair and watch as the film flickered on the thread work.
Occasional Labor,
installation with original 16mm film
by Matthew Drescher and Valerie Constantino
and bell buoy audio capture by Ken Bell
During that same period, I'd written an essay entitled Domestic Gestures in consideration of the ephemeral nature of domestic activities, identifying those processes as an integrated art form. It was the first expression of my inclination towards an interdisciplinary study of domestic culture and materiality in relation to impermanence.
Subsequently, I composed two essays, each a reflection of specific aspects of these ideas. The first one entitled Threadlore (Surface Design Journal, Fall, 1994) considered mythological and cosmological allusions to textile processes such as spinning and weaving in relation to fundamental structures of matter. The next one, Textile: An Event in Time (Fiberarts, Sept / Oct, 1995), examined the works of several textile artists whose work underscores process as a discrete creative element.
My compilation of six additional essays can be accessed by clicking the book cover image above. Each essay represents a further and particular examination of textile as a poetic configuration in relation to subjects that penetrate the fugitive qualities of being.