Karyl Dokos

Adelina's Alley

noreply@blogger.com (Karyl Dokos) — Sat, 08 Jul 2017 22:28:00 +0000

Adelina's Alley

-1950s party dress, 50s mens shirt, 60s woven cotton curtains, Jack Lenor Larsen upholstery, Breton knit shirt

From Vittorio de Sica's 1963 film "Ieri, Oggi, Domani".

The colors, fabrics, and architectural space in this screenshot inspired the textile.

Infrastructure: making it as I find it

noreply@blogger.com (Karyl Dokos) — Fri, 30 Jun 2017 21:53:00 +0000

This textile began with the opening of my grandmother's 1950s blue wool coat. What I found within--the frayed woven webbing, rose colored bias tape, two-toned satin lining, thick wool seams-- had such strong sculptural possibilities that I left them intact as the jumping-off point for the resulting textile.

Infrastructure

1950s wool coat including cotton webbing, bias tape, satin lining; early 20thc velvet, 70s cotton velour pants, burlap, canvas backing

Tampa/West Palm Direct

noreply@blogger.com (Karyl Dokos) — Mon, 12 Jun 2017 15:04:00 +0000

Tampa/West Palm Direct
-Fabrics 1930s-present, including cargo pants seams and remnants from my kimono robe project

This textile is another "art of conversation" piece-- the initial design was laid out during a phone conversation

with a friend who was driving from his home in Tampa to visit his parents in West Palm Beach.

Porching it in my robe with Tillycat.

Mash-up 1 and John Chamberlain sculpture

noreply@blogger.com (Karyl Dokos) — Wed, 07 Jun 2017 14:54:00 +0000

Mash-up 1
-1960s curtains and assorted scraps

"Delores James" by John Chamberlain, 1962
Photo Credit: Guggenheim

Eucalyptus

noreply@blogger.com (Karyl Dokos) — Sat, 20 May 2017 22:01:00 +0000

Eucalyptus
-1960s wool coat and satin lining, 50s party dress with tulle trim, hand-embroidered tea-dyed burlap,
80s bed sheet, cargo pants seams

Eucalyptus bark at a friend's house, Woodland Hills, CA. As soon as I saw the
tree, I knew I would make a textile, and exactly which fabrics I would use.

My mother's 1960s wool coat, transitioning from garment to art.
I love the two-tone coral/gray, shiny/matte satin lining. The construction
details-- inseams, hems, edges cut with pinking shears-- are kept intact
and used as-is in the textile.

My mom (right) and her two sisters in 1950s party gowns.
The green fabric in the textile, if not from one of these dresses, is
from one similar.

No Donkey, No Blindfold- inspired by Utamaro geishas and Kuniyoshi samurai

noreply@blogger.com (Karyl Dokos) — Sat, 18 Feb 2017 17:25:00 +0000

No Donkey, No Blindfold
-1930s matelasse bedspread, 60s floral print cotton, 60s curtains, 70s corduroy Levi's, tape measure, zipper

The contrasting floral prints and sharp black slashes are inspired by the 18th-19thc prints of Utamaro and Kunioshi..

Iceland Goes Through: the art of conversation

noreply@blogger.com (Karyl Dokos) — Sun, 13 Nov 2016 15:17:00 +0000

Iceland Goes Through

- 1950s woven cotton upholstery, 60s gingham dress, 60s curtains,

80s paisley upholstery

... one of several textiles I've laid out during phone conversations with friends. In these works, the present moment is considered as much a material as the fabric; there is a natural interweaving of dialogues--internal and external, fabrics and friendship. During this particular conversation, a friend who is an avid soccer fan was telling me about the rise of Iceland, the Cinderella team in the Euro 2016 tournament. As she recounted each win, she would say

"...and so, Iceland goes through."

Hat Brim/Peine del Viento

noreply@blogger.com (Karyl Dokos) — Mon, 22 Aug 2016 01:16:00 +0000

Hat Brim/Peine del Viento
- 1990s black velvet hat brim and various scraps, 1920s-present

Point of departure-- a hat brim I cut out in the nineties for a project never completed.

...thinking of Eduardo Chillida's sculpture, Peine del Viento (Comb of the Wind).

Seaside painting by Nicolas de Stael

The Red Shirt

noreply@blogger.com (Karyl Dokos) — Tue, 19 Jul 2016 00:35:00 +0000

The Red Shirt
-1970s cotton shirt, 2000s Gap chinos, various scraps on burlap

The old barn behind our house.

Lapstrake, Ticking, and Rachel Carey George/Gee's Bend quilt

noreply@blogger.com (Karyl Dokos) — Tue, 19 Jul 2016 00:31:00 +0000

Lapstrake
- Gap jeans c.2000, early 20th c velvet, 1970s velour pants, silk, wool, cheesecloth, burlap

Ticking
- early 20th c mattress ticking, wood toothpicks, cotton string, tea-dyed burlap

Ticking removed from cotton boll stuffed mattress.

Gee's Bend/ Rachel Carey George quilt

The use of old clothing and household items in my work is directly inspired by the Gee's Bend quilt makers, a group of African American women living in close-knit geographically isolated communities of Alabama. Their work, originally made of whatever salvageable materials were available, represents an important cultural and visual contribution to the history of 20th c African American art. In need of warmth, and with no time to fuss over intricate patterns and piecework, the Gee's Bend artists created a non-traditional aesthetic vision which incorporates the idiosyncrasies and past lives of recycled goods. In this quilt by Rachel Carey George (1909-2011)--made of wool trousers, jeans, and mattress ticking--the faded ghost prints of pockets become compositional elements in the overall design.

Tidepool

noreply@blogger.com (Karyl Dokos) — Sun, 20 Mar 2016 20:39:00 +0000

Tidepool
-1970s disco jacket, 70s polyester mens pants, 70s velour womens pants, 60s dress

Clyfford Still painting: "PH-241", 1949
which I saw recently at the MFAH.
Photo credit: Clyfford Still Museum Denver via MFAH website

Other scraps include my grandmother's 1960's dress and my mother's 1970's cotton velour pants

Materials and memory

noreply@blogger.com (Karyl Dokos) — Fri, 11 Mar 2016 21:31:00 +0000

Bird's nest pillow cover made with assorted scraps

Oriented strand board

Apartment courtyard, Milan,1983

....looking at my work through the lens of my architectural experiences,
in the use of materials, and the memories of places I've lived.

"Blue" -- 1970's velour pants, silk scraps, and tea-dyed burlap

noreply@blogger.com (Karyl Dokos) — Wed, 07 Oct 2015 20:40:00 +0000

Wall hanging made from Clara's (aka Mom's) 1970s cotton velour pants, silk scraps, tea-dyed burlap, and various threads. Inscription labels on back made from 1960s cotton curtain lining.

For my friend Julie Cohn who designs and makes beautiful jewelry

and loves....

Adelina's Alley: take 1 and 2

noreply@blogger.com (Karyl Dokos) — Sat, 29 Aug 2015 15:48:00 +0000

This screen shot from "Adelina", one of a trilogy of three short stories in Vittorio de Sica 's 1963 film "Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow" [Ieri, Oggi, Domani] was the inspiration for the pillow design. The combination of neutral colors with bright colors and white, the patterns, the weave of the man's suit, and the architectural lines of the alley all play into the design.

A couple of the fabrics are even in sync with the time period of the film-- the woven beige cotton was the curtains from our 1960's patio home, the green plaid was my dad's shirt from the same time period.

This is my dad in 1959 with my two oldest sisters here in central Texas.

The raw silk is cut from a tunic top my sister made for herself in the late 1980's- early 90's, a Claude Montana design. The fabric is breaking down from age and it causes me pain to cut up her hard work, but once the material is backed with fusible inner facing it's usable again, so why not?

Framing

Edge strips

Here are the edge strips trimmed from the pillow cover and sewn together to create a new textile.

The process of framing and trimming is self-generative.

Monica Vitti's existential crisis and my grandfather's long johns - it's hot and cold in "The Red Desert".

noreply@blogger.com (Karyl Dokos) — Sun, 14 Jun 2015 14:05:00 +0000

The Girl on the Beach clip from "The Red Desert"

film

Monica Vitti in a still from Michelangelo Antonioni's film The Red Desert (Il Deserto Rosso), 1964.
The blocks of color, lines, and fabrics in this photo inspired the pillow design.

materials

Fabrics used include my grandfather's woolen long johns-- ca. 1960 or earlier-- with his last name, Hermes, handwritten on waistband; 1970's corduroy Levis; red cotton batik remnants from the lapel of the poppy robe I designed and made . Other scraps include digital print silk I made into a scarf, an orange cotton print sample brought from India years ago by the husband of a friend of mine, 1980's curtain fabric from my sister, and red plaid silk upholstery sample.

process

The random sizes and shapes of the scraps form the basis of the composition.

A few weeks ago I stitched together pieces of the Levis to make a pigment sheet with no idea how I would use it; the irregular piecing and layers reminded me of Serge Poliakoff 's paintings, which I love:

in progress

The first mock-up was a series of mostly vertical lines, much like the film photo.

The texture and color of Monica Vitti's sweater made me think to add in my grandfather's woolen long johns-- the triangular shape of the waistband shifted the composition, broke up the grid.
The manufacturer's label and my grandmother's handwriting inside were a surprise that begged to be exposed.

Hans Hofmann

I was thinking of Hans Hoffman 's early to mid-1960's color block paintings, which he was doing at the same time Antonioni was making this film. In the photo below, you can see how art of the period was influencing film set design, in the use of blocks of color, and even the attention to the paint-- the unevenness of the layers, and the texture of it peeling away from the surfaces.

Here's Tillycat doing her best Monica Vitti impersonation.

details

Venetian silk meets oil rag [nee 1960's man's shirt]

noreply@blogger.com (Karyl Dokos) — Wed, 06 May 2015 22:06:00 +0000

... thinking of architectural details and proportions...
Steven Holl's design for the Pace Gallery, NYC, early 1990's.

oil stains and shirt tail hem

Collage Pillow 1, plus "Ieri, Oggi, Domani"

noreply@blogger.com (Karyl Dokos) — Sat, 28 Feb 2015 14:50:00 +0000

rotations:

Film and fabrics:

This week I watched Vittorio de Sica's film "Ieri, Oggi, Domani" , a trilogy of short films within a film starring Sophia Loren and Marcello Mastroianni. I was struck by the colors, patterns, and textures in the clothing, architecture, props-- everything so beautifully thought out.

It's a comprehensive approach that brought to mind the diverse group of fabrics in my collection, which span a wide range of time periods, various family members' personal tastes, functions etc.-- interesting to think of each group of fabrics as a scene, a place, an event. Some of the fabrics in the collection, such as the green and gray windowpane plaid shirt-- a rag which I recovered from my dad's work shed-- are from around the same time period as the movie, mid-sixties.

Love the Lipton boxes and other products, the pop of turquoise in the doorway.

Note the occurrence of blue in this series of market scenes.

.. and the geometric patterned dress that strolls through.

LOVE this one-- the linear structure and use of shadow to reinforce it, the texture of the wall at the back, the pop of orange amid grays and beiges.

I was reminded of this painting by Nicolas de Stael . The monochrome image above emphasizes the lines and spatial composition. Below is the original painting with all of its glorious colors.

back to the film....

Is that a pile of giant lemons?

You can't miss the yellow in these frames.

So small that red license plate, but what an impact.

and a pop of red again in this one.

Crazy colored cabinets! Note the blood-red pot with the turquoise bowl back left.

Overview

noreply@blogger.com (Karyl Dokos) — Fri, 20 Feb 2015 20:26:00 +0000

pillow covers

"When the soul wants to experience something, she throws out an image in front of her and steps into it."- Meister Eckhart (1260-1328)

noreply@blogger.com (Karyl Dokos) — Mon, 09 Feb 2015 19:07:00 +0000

Gunta Stolzl wallhanging "Geturmt" 1973

Sonia Delaunay scarf and a note card from a friend

Sophie Taeuber Arp weaving "Elementary Forms" 1917

Sophie Tauber Arp with her puppets-- 1918

View from my studio

Pants pillow

noreply@blogger.com (Karyl Dokos) — Tue, 20 Jan 2015 18:07:00 +0000

Pillow made from 1960's? cotton corduroy pants that belonged to my brother-in-law's grandfather, 1920's (or earlier) wool tapestry , 1960's cotton curtain fabric, assorted silk, linen, and cotton scraps, a vintage tape measure, and catfish line (a nod to the time his grandfather spent in the Louisiana bayous.)

construction project

interior of pillow front showing applique stitching on old sheet, and white cotton pants pockets at bottom

.. plaid lining of the pillow back... I resorted to hand-stitching in places at the side seams where my machine couldn't sew over the thick pocket-seams in the pants. One aspect of working with a garment-- something I've been wanting to try-- is working around bulky seams. Using the pants was an opportunity for me to do that and to make something for my brother-in-law and sister that has personal meaning, but the process was cumbersome, so I think I'll call this experiment a one-off.

no-label pants

The corduroys used in the pillow were one among several "no-label" pairs of pants, including these chinos, which appear to be professionally made. The quality of construction details, while beyond amateur sewing, is nowhere near the finish level of fine tailoring. A guess is that his grandfather regularly ordered up sturdy and serviceable pants from his tailor and said "make it fast".

thinking of...

Peruvian artist Jorge Eielson who made art with old clothes-- this is Camicia 1964-- came to mind.

Also the Gee's Bend work-clothes quilts, like this one by Lutisha Pettway The dark spots indicate pockets that were removed prior to sewing, possibly to avoid sewing over bulky seams?

post-notes

....the return of Tillycat

New, old, ancient

noreply@blogger.com (Karyl Dokos) — Tue, 06 Jan 2015 18:36:00 +0000

New pillow made from vintage fabrics (1920's- 2013) which include a 1930's blue cotton flour sack, 1950-60's gray floral-print cotton (my grandmother's curtains), green woven 1960's cotton (our den curtains growing up), 1980's plaid wool (my sister's pants), and newly bought yellow burlap and digital print silk from my scarf .

Color

I think the oldest fabric in the group is this red woven wool which was in a box with some other upholstery scraps and a receipt dated September 1926. The color and weave brought to mind ancient South American textiles....

......like the one I sketched when I visited the "Wari: Lords of the Andes" exhibition at the Kimbell Art Museum in Aug 2013.

Referencing the photo in the exhibition catalog, I pulled together the other fabrics to complete the color palette.

Composition

the main idea was to showcase the pattern and weave of the red wool.

thinking of a color-blocked composition like Hans Hofmann 's painting "Elysium"

Texture

The blue wool plaid reminded me of Japanese boro textiles , like this jacket

and since I wanted to use up some scraps that were already in strips, I sewed them, along with other darker cotton scraps onto an old bed sheet.

Then I cut that textile into strips...

and sewed those strips in layers to make a textile. The white sheet pops through in places and accentuates lines and texture.

the scrap of digital print silk was added just before I sewed the pillow together.

Pattern

Here, the right and wrong side of the curtain fabric are sewn together to make a new pattern. The matrix of raised, stitched lines is the result of sewing with a double needle. The curtain fabric is old and tears easily in places; sewing it onto a lining not only reinforces it, but creates another texture, a map-like effect, which I really like.

Label

The handwritten label sewn onto the pillow back is made of the cotton lining of our 1960's den curtains.

Rotations

Rock pillow and beyond

noreply@blogger.com (Karyl Dokos) — Wed, 24 Dec 2014 00:06:00 +0000

Rock pillow made with recycled fabrics--
green woven cotton 1960's curtain, light blue 1960's cotton canvas shower curtain. Other fabrics include tea-dyed burlap, Italian linen, and silk.
The yellow burlap and orange silk edge strips are trimmed from the Istanbul textile

trimming the pillow front:

and playing with the edgestrips
-- the leftovers from one project generate ideas for the next:

rotations

post-note

Usually Tillycat joins my photo-shoots, but today she took refuge from the cold wind in a plant container.

Points of departure

noreply@blogger.com (Karyl Dokos) — Tue, 28 Oct 2014 22:10:00 +0000

A mock-up for a pillow made of new and vintage fabrics-- the idea of layers that meet in the center was inspired by this rock which comes from a rock collection my sister made when she was twelve. She's a geologist now, and I'm making the pillow for her; I like that the design has a personal connection to her.

My first pass at the design was more starburst-y.
I decided to simplify it after I completed and trimmed....

.... this wall hanging I made for my niece . I cut a wide piece of fabric off the left side (orange silk and yellow burlap), and liked it so much that I decided to organize the pillow design around it. You can see in the first photo that it's one of the cross-bars ... a good example of how projects can overlap and influence each other.

Magnification

A close examination of the wall hanging reveals lots of possible designs within the overall design, any one of which would make a great pillow. These cropped views, which in reality are only about 3"x3", could definitely work at a much larger scale.

So a project which started with a fairly literal (for me anyway) interpretation of this photo my niece took in Istanbul has yielded a wealth of materials, both physically in the form of leftover fabric, and conceptually in design ideas for future projects.

From past to present...

I've been looking through some slides I took 30 years ago in Europe which have been stored away for years, and came across this courtyard view in Milan, taken from the kitchen window of a good friend's apartment.

As soon as I saw it, I was astonished to recognize the loose organization of lines and textures around a central, choppy, irregularly-angled shape of the bird's nest pillow -- a testament to the catalog of visual references we retain in our unconscious which emerge in the most surprising ways. It's no wonder that that kitchen has staked out a space in my head. I spent a lot of time there, staring out the window, laughing with my friends and listening to their stories, and learning about and eating a lot of good food.

Day for Night Shirt.... adapting a pattern (in progress)

I'm working on adapting the design of this linen shirt made by a company called Matchpoint. I have a couple of these and enjoy wearing them so much I decided to make my own using two different linens.

It kind of reminds me of the dress my great Aunt Myrta is wearing in this photo. The buttons I'm using for the shirt are vintage grey mother-of-pearl from her collection

I call it the "Day for Night" shirt because it reminds me of an old-fashioned nightshirt, and because I would like my daytime, waking life to be as creatively articulate as my nighttime, dreaming life. There's also the expression "day for night" which refers to film scenes shot during the day with a special filter to make it appear as if it's night.... an idea that jives with my desire to blur the lines between my dreaming and waking life.

... back to making the shirt--- first I worked out the front tucks, designed a neckband, and then added vertical seams in the darker linen which contrast the direction of the pinstripes. I'm waiting to cut the armholes and side seams until last-- will add in some in-seam side pockets which the original shirts don't have. Love pockets.

The back has a yoke--the pale center line is the exposed selvage-

and a long vertical pleat.....

which brought to mind this runnel at the Salk Institute designed by Louis Kahn ...speaking of pictures embedded in one's memory-- the giant projected slide images from Prof Rodriguez's Architecture 101 obviously have carved out a place in mine.

Clothes and making things

A friend of mine and I frequently have conversations about clothes and what they communicate. Lately I've been thinking that I want my clothes to say, "I'm ready to make pillows or pies, anytime, anywhere."

Pear pomegranate pies from this NYT recipe .... served warm with sea-salt caramel ice-cream,

so yummy I must have been dreaming.

Freedom flag

noreply@blogger.com (Karyl Dokos) — Mon, 20 Oct 2014 18:47:00 +0000

back of textile

- flag made of some of the fabrics in this post , and this post , including the tea-dyed remnants of my old bedspread

Oh freedom - Aaron Neville.
from the album-- I Know I've Been Changed

From the kitchen to Istanbul--scraps of fabrics, scraps of ideas PLUS Daniel Gordon and Mickalene Thomas

noreply@blogger.com (Karyl Dokos) — Tue, 23 Sep 2014 18:26:00 +0000

This is a textile I made from my pile of small scraps --silk, old curtains, wool, velvet, corduroy, old bedspread-- all sewed onto a piece of tea-dyed burlap,

...which I then cut into pieces and arranged on yellow burlap-- I like the slashy effect.
The process is self generative: arranging/ attaching/ cutting, then rearranging/ attaching/ cutting. It could go on and on, yielding infinite itererations. Nothing is predetermined, I have no idea of the outcome when I begin.

Here are the same pieces on black wool, looking something like an intersection in a city plan. I could sew them on in this configuration, then cut that textile into pieces which would make yet another new textile. It'a an endless path.

___________________________________________

... looking around this week at artists' work that focuses on color, shape and patterns, like the still lifes of Daniel Gordon

and the landscapes of Mickalene Thomas

_________________________________________

a photo my niece took in Istanbul this summer....

from which I put together this preliminary"sketch" using cutouts from the screen in her picture. The blue patterned cotton is from India,

one of a set of swatches brought to a friend by her husband who was travelling there in the 1980's.

This project is a new experience for me in that it's "about" something-- a collection of friends' and family relationships and experiences; a husband thinking of his wife when he's away from home, a young person traveling alone for the first time. It's about how we capture memories of our experiences with images and objects. It's inclusive.

And in contrast to the burlap strips, it's an intentional process, at least partially predetermined from the outset. I wanted to make something personal for my niece as a college graduation gift, something that includes a piece of her life, so I suggested using one of her photos to make a textile. Graphically I like what I'm seeing in the mock-up, but am not that excited about cutting pieces from a template.
I wonder about the literalness of this particular interpretation and how comfortable I am with that.

It is however, a gift, and since my niece really likes the mock-up, and I like the photo and that it captures her vision, I'll continue to work with it and see what happens. I'm very curious to see what comes out.

A last note about this process-- judging by how much I've just written, there seem to be a lot of words attached to it. I'm getting tired of words, just wanting to focus more on making things rather than meaning, to pursue the not-quite ineffable , because that's too grand a word.

_____________________________

made with random scraps: 1950-60's pink cotton chrysanthemum fabric from my grandmother Catherine, brown basket-weave 1950's upholstery fabric, various 1980's woven gray cottons (my sister's pants scraps). The leopard is a 1990's upholstery scrap from a friend's office/library. Other fabrics include upholstery samples, wool and silk.