Sarah Vaeth – Off the Grid

-
Opening Reception:
Gallery Hours:

September 6 – 22, 2013
Gallery Hours: On Display 24/7, Special hours posted on website and by appointment
Artist Reception: Friday, September 20 from 6:00 – 9:00 pm
Nisus Gallery: 8371 N Interstate, Studio 1, Portland, OR

Nisus Gallery is pleased to present Sarah Vaeth’s Off the Grid. 

Off the Grid is an exhibit of both Vaeth’s paintings and installation. The piece created for this show, Nautilus Tent, is ‘painterly’- conversely, with origins in previous monochrome wire installations that were cool and austere.  Nautilus introduces color through paint and fabric, amplifying the sensual aspect of textile once only present in Vaeth’s paintings. The paintings for this show- two new ones and two older pieces – add additional aesthetic, conceptional, architectural and textile qualities discover this.  

Artist Statement

The work I’m doing now inhabits a set of intersections: between abstract expressionism and post-minimalism, between painting and craft. I enlist the expressive qualities of line, color and geometry, to construct forms referencing the architecture and interior trappings of domesticity: forms that are shelters (tents, huts,walls, enfolding caves and overhangs), forms that are textiles (tapestries, blankets).  I’m not properly a fiber artist, but I do use fabric and thread; and I use paint and metal in ways analogous to manipulations of fabric and thread- ’embroidering,’ ‘stitching,’ ‘weaving.’  I like the symbolic cargo of textile,  traditionally ‘women’s work.’  I’m interested both in the nurturing associations of textiles, and the Classical equation of women’s craft with ‘craftiness’- with deception and seduction: the weaving as a web or net. Similarly, a shelter can be a home, a symbolic womb, or a trap.  

About Sarah Vaeth

Sarah Vaeth received her MFA from Colorado State University. She has shown at the Fort Collins Lincoln Center, Art Lab, and Wilson Adams Gallery (Denver, CO). She currently resides in Portland, OR.

sarahvaeth.net