Amanda Triplett
Making art in the space where fine art and craftwork intersect, I manipulate, layer, and embroider salvaged fibers into abstractions of biology. I create sculptural, performance, and installation works about human relationship to biological and cultural narratives.
Recycled materials are central to my process and inform the themes I work with as an artist. I disassemble salvaged towels, sweaters, and t-shirts that have warmed and wiped the bodies of their previous owners. Fascinated by wear on the weave of recycled fibers, I treat aging and deterioration as a part of the creative process. Using needle and thread, I manipulate and sew the fiber into new form. The resulting pieces are organic and biologically inspired, utilizing the natural tendency of fabric to crease and flow. Utilizing surface, texture and vivid colors as my main tools, the work addresses ecology, the complexity of the internal human landscape, and identity.
Residuals is an exhibition of sculptural fiberworks made from salvaged textiles that reimagine the internal landscape of the body. Working with materials gleaned from thrift stores, garbage piles and free boxes, I select well-worn items of intimacy like garments, towels, and linens. Theses objects come to me with stories of wear and stains. Having caressed and contained the bodies of their former owners, they are replete with bodily knowledge and shaped by their wearing. My making process itself is performative of the work traditionally given women, as I take fabric wash it, sew and nurture it into these fundamental body objects.
The form language of these sculptural works reference qualities of body-ness. Oozing, soft, supple, fibrous, and organic, these sculptures explore the struggles of having a body, being a body, and wearing a body. My work asks how we reconcile our fleshy masses with the culturally-designated and expected body narratives of womanhood. Turning the body inside out, this series facilitates a conversation between our socially contracted second skins (clothing) and the emotionality of our inner landscape.
For more information about the artist, please visit her website.
