installation and sewed its artworks, I thought about communicating with ancestors and what is lost in
the gap between disparate times. I researched tactile traditions that are in danger of extinction when
expediency is valued over care. Especially in this moment of uncertainty about the role of new,
quickly advancing technologies, we are likely to lose cultural knowledge faster than we realize its
value. These losses might include techniques only passed down through in-person study, willingness
to seek answers without digital assistance, patience.
For me, loss manifests in wanting to call my great grandmothers on the phone to ask them for quilting advice. They have already passed on, but I keep listening for advice from my ancestors. I am uncertain I interpret their messages accurately. Between their time and mine is a rift greater than physical distance. What is lost in translation?
Zooey : As a fellow quilter and textile artist, I have to ask you about your process. Where do you first start when assembling a quilt? Do you plan ahead, or plan as you go? What are your favorite parts of the process?
Iris: I typically start by looking at the materials I have and identifying which colors and patterns I am drawn to for a project. My Great Grandma Flatt used to buy new fabric for just about every quilt she made, which resulted in a massive hoard of fabrics she never used. Warned by her example, I avoid buying anything new. I like to think of quilting in terms of using what is available, piecing scraps, combining thoughts and moments in time, sort of like a textile collage.
I enjoy planning an entire design on my computer before I start cutting fabric, drawing shapes and figuring out where various colors will land, and I've made a few quilts that way, but the one in the window display was different. I worked with pencil and paper to plan out which quilt blocks I wanted to make, which I based on books from my aunt's collection. Once I had those blocks pieced, I laid them out on the floor and worked on the text. The rest of the piecing was improvised, and the quilting I designed as I went.
My favorite part of the process? That's hard. I like when I've just pieced two pieces of fabric and I iron them and see the seam for the first time. I also love when I'm working on any artwork and I need to sit down and write three pages of text about what ideas are driving me to make the work. That's a good sign I'm working on something important to me.
Iris: My great grandmothers were all quilters, as were my great aunts. I had a fantasy to return to my hometown for a few months after college to learn from my Aunt Beth, and I talked about it when I was starting college. My Aunt Beth passed away the day before I presented my thesis. I owe most of what I know about sewing to her and to my grandmothers and great grandmothers. I don't draft a pattern, cut fabric, nor thread a needle without thinking of them.
Once I started making quilts on my own, it was important that I respected the spirit of what they taught me. I learned from my relatives that generosity is part of the practice. They made and gave away quilts on major life occasions like marriages or new children. It's strange to make quilts for the purpose of hanging in a gallery, but I have started thinking of them as a public gift.
Another thought I had about lost tradition was about typography. I was reading about type design the month leading up to making this quilt, and I thought about graphic design having changed so much by reliance on digital tools. Older type designs are very referential to calligraphy. Nowadays you can click some buttons on a computer and make a new font without ever talking to another person about lettering. The trend has been to strip away many principles of design and all ornamental aspects of glyphs, but the results are not always readable or pleasant. When I went about making text for this quilt, I wanted to work only with my hands and to throw all type principles out the window to demonstrate the degradation of these lineages. Losing traditions is like a game of telephone, the details going first.
Zooey: To the point about loss of knowledge exchange - what has it been like to seek out that knowledge on your own? How has that learning impacted the way you see that loss or absence?
Iris: I love doing research, especially out of books. I know that there are thousands upon thousands of videos of crafters teaching their techniques on the internet, but I really prefer to walk into a public library and flip through books. Books are slower, less distracting than screens, and typically more careful presentations of knowledge. For this project, I was fortunate to have access to several books from my Aunt Beth's home quilting studio, as well as a few from my Aunt Lynn's collection. I discovered that they owned one book in common, a guide to quilting techniques, which served me well. It takes so much longer to learn something from a book than from an expert showing you what you're missing. Sometimes I felt like I was faking something my grandmothers had been doing more authentically. I'm sure there are tricks they would have taught me if they were there.
Zooey: Your work centers around communication and translation; what draws you to textiles as a medium in which you communicate?
Iris: Textiles have a rich global history as objects of communication. I am drawn to the experience of communicating in tactile and visual methods, and in performing and presenting the self through adornment. Everyone makes choices about the textiles they wear every day, and those choices present them to others and act as shorthand for a range of contexts and identity markers. Having spent (and still spending, if I'm honest) ample time thinking about what clothes and colors and materials tell other people that I am queer in various contexts, I feel these choices are very relevant to community forming.
I am very drawn to tactile work in general, which includes textiles and books in my art practice. I prefer to make something that is touched, moved, worn, or said aloud than something that lives on a wall. I want my works to have shared lives beyond what I see when I step away from them.
Zooey: I’m interested in your wearable work - the garment in your window installation, as well as the works in the series you’ve titled “Book Body.” Can you talk a little about your approach to wearable work specifically?
Whenever I begin a new Book Body, I think about the text that it will embody, either something I have researched or something I have written. Just like when I am making an artist's book, I consider what materials and forms best reflect the theme. With wearable work, this is especially fun because the work will move, be seen from different angles, even change through being worn.
Zooey: You described the process of making this work as an attempt to listen to your ancestors. Did they talk to you while you were working on this? What have they told you?
Iris: Yes, but it's kind of a long story. My aunt does readings when requested. Before I began this quilt, I gave her a call, and she did a reading for me. She said my ancestors were with me, "cheering you on." That's the message I most often hear from them: a simple, "keep going," that goes a long way. Maybe it's the message I want to hear. In addition to the reading and a few select repeated signs, I have vivid dreams. Sometimes they're easy to interpret, but other times there are symbols or objects in them that stick with me. I know this sounds like I'm reading into something that might be nothing, but I prefer it that way. It's more of a spiritual attention than something that needs explanation or solid proof. All communication holds some amount of ambiguity.
Zooey: What does good communication feel like?
Many of my thoughts about communication are about miscommunications that lead to unexpected outcomes, for better or worse. Sometimes being unknown, speaking in colloquials specific to a group, can form closer bonds, and other times inaccessible language can be exclusive and elitist. My goal in making artwork is not "good" communication, but rather to reference and discuss all the ways communication lands away from its intention.
Zooey: Is a quilt an archive?
It can be! The AIDS Quilts, for example, are archives of loved ones who passed away and how they are remembered. Not every quilt ever made is an archive, but they all say something about their makers and the times and places they were created, like any artworks.
Zooey: What makes something well preserved?
Salt, vinegar, cold temperatures, thorough documentation, cultural importance, continued practice, shared knowledge, and people who care to keep it.
Zooey: Where does this work go next?
This particular work goes on my bed when spring begins, because quilts should be touched. The wearable goes on my body, because clothes should be performed. As for the practice, I will keep quilting and making wearables and knitting and writing. At some point I would love to make an immersive installation.
Iris Wright
(xe/xem/xyr) is a transdisciplinary artist who makes books, wearable sculptures, and many objects in-between to investigate failures in communication. These failures have included misrepresentations, archival absences, censorship, mistranslations, contextual rewrites, and lost traditions. Xe grew up in northern Illinois, graduated with honors from Brown University, and now teaches book arts in addition to maintaining an art practice. With xyr artist collective abcpvd (Art Book Collective, Providence), xe organizes group art shows and events to connect people through tactile and participatory artwork. See more of xyr work at iriswrite.com.
