Gender and art

Flore Gardner, "Chiasmus" (detail), 2013.

OSLO.- If you mention embroidery, many will immediately think of tablecloths with floral vines, bell pulls, or landscapes created through cross-stitching. In recent years, however, embroidery has been taken up again and discussed in contemporary art, thereby showing that preconceived notions should be reassessed. The National Museum’s new exhibition “The Needle’s Eye: Contemporary Embroidery”, to be displayed at the Museum of Decorative Arts and Design from 22 February to 16 May 2015, may well be a step in that direction.

The exhibition “The Needle’s Eye: Contemporary Embroidery” focuses on embroidery as an artistic expression. Embroidery as an action and a technique is enmeshed in charged histories about gender roles, status, power, and artistic value, histories that contemporary deliberately exploit in their works. The exhibition also reflects embroidery’s flexibility and scope both in style and in its use of materials.

http://www.nasjonalmuseet.no/en/

Christa Maiwald, Self-portrait with Vermeer's "The Lacemaker", 2013.

When Christa Maiwald emerged from art school in the mid 1970s, women artists, influenced by the "raised consciousness" of feminism, were claiming the subject of their own lives as a vital topic in their art. Exploring the intersection of art and life, Maiwald's early video work of this period focused on loss of innocence. Yet, interlaced with these weighty themes of sex and violence, was a narrative with often comic threads. Moving on to painting, sculpture and installation, Maiwald eventually landed on embroidery as a medium that enabled her to confront social issues in an indirect form. The art of stitching both emblazons and belies her provocative subject matter, permitting time for the powerful meaning of her works to penetrate.

Maiwald's embroidery is not your grandmother's. Her work is iconoclastic. In her new exhibition, Short Stories and Other Embroideries, on view at Guild Hall in East Hampton until January 5, 2014, Maiwald alternately sticks her needle into the heart of political stereotypes or investigates identity and artistic heritage.

http://www.guildhall.org/museum-2/current-exhibitions/

Jessica Wohl, “White Mask” (2012), embroidery on found photograph.

"New York’s art world seems to be experiencing a newfound love affair with art made by hand — art that has, dare I say, “craft” in it.

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The latest craft art making a strong appearance is embroidery, at Robert Mann Gallery, which has mounted a stunning exhibition of artists who embroider on top of photographs. Curated by Orly Cogan, who has included herself in the show, The Embroidered Image features the work of 11 artists who have found creative ways to meld two unlikely mediums."

The Embroidered Image continues at Robert Mann Gallery (525 W 26th Street, Chelsea, Manhattan) through August 15.

http://www.robertmann.com/exhibitions/current.html