THE BEAUTY OF DECOMPOSITION

Are you attracted to old rusty objects? I think many people are. Or is it that many people in my circle are also Baby Boomers, who are themselves becoming rusty objects? Hmmm.

Anyway, I'm attracted not only to the colors, patinas, patterns but the shapes of objects that have been around long enough to rust. Here in the Southwest USA, that means barbed wire, spirals and wheels from old mines, square headed nails and so many other old objects I can't even identify by name.

For years---yes, years!----I've held onto boxes of rusty metal finds that I've collected during Nard's and my travels, which I've tried and tried to figure out how to make them into art pieces that wouldn't just look like something from a weekend craft show booth.

Having reached the phase of life in which I'm more interested in diminishing than acquiring , last year I made a commitment to either do something definite with the boxes of rusty objects or get rid of them.

Rusty items as I prepare to bury them with an assortment of vintage textiles.

Harvesting my “crop!”

Aware of artists such as Canadian Caitlin Ffrench (@ffrench) who are distressing textiles with water and fire, I thought why not with soil? Our tomato garden area had long gone unused and so last spring (eek, a year ago already!) I got excited by the idea of “planting” my collection of vintage textiles (also sitting unused in a box) underneath rusty objects and our red Colorado dirt.

Work in Progress from “harvested” Rust Garden: “She’s Come Undone.”

Fall came and I “harvested” my “crops!”

In Progress: slow stitching on “Mending Mother Earth.”

I'm still working on what to do with my “new” materials, but I do have some observations and swirling thoughts about utilizing this decomposed cloth in my work to conceptualize humankind's degradation of Mother Earth.

The rust garden feels like I'm connecting with history and nature in tangible ways. These textiles have stories to tell, and by working with them, I'm connecting with that history in a very real way. When I buried the cloth and rusty objects, I allowed nature to take control of the outcome. Waiting to see what emerged months later gave honor to the power of nature, and to the importance of patience and surrender. The rust and soil, and I'm guessing rodents chewing on the cloth to create holes, created unexpected patterns and color variations that would be impossible to replicate through any other means.

This experiment has turned into a reminder that some things in life cannot be rushed or forced, and that the passage of time and the forces of nature can create something brilliant out of something seemingly ordinary.

The epitome of slow stitching! The tea towel is quite fragile. My interest is in preserving the chunks of dirt and sticks that adhered to the cloth during the 7 months’ it matured underground. I feel I am “suturing” and “splinting” Mother Earth, symbolic of the urgent need I feel as we approach yet another “Earth Day.”

MENDING A SOCK

“THINGS FALL APART,” Encaustic on Panel, 24 x 24. From “The Clothes We Wear,” upcoming December 2021 solo exhibition at Kreuser Gallery. A percentage of all sales from this exhibition will be donated to Who Gives a SCRAP/Art SWAP 501c3 to support children's local programming.

Like many whose childhood occurred during the 1950's and 1960's, I grew up with hand-me-downs from an older cousin or sibling. It was a make-do concept championed by parents whose own childhood was shaped by the 1930's depression era. We shopped for new apparel once a year, school clothing and shoes, at JC Penney's, Wards, or Sears.

Thus for me, all I dreamt of was buying new. By the time I was living on my own, a transformation in the clothing industry was emerging that suited my desire (and thin budget) for all things new. With the 1992 signing of NAFTA and the outsourcing of American garment manufacturing, a new era in clothing manufacturing erupted. Fast Fashion arrived with the emergence of retailers such as Zara, H&M, Old Navy and American Eagle, companies born of cheap overseas labor.

Over the last forty years, marketing and cut-rate pricing has created our see now, buy now, discard now approach to contemporary fashion. For the past two years, I have been working on creating an exhibition that calls our attention to viable alternatives to a closet full of cheaply made, unsustainably sourced clothing.

One such approach is to extend the life of an article of clothing with mending. Although I learned how to sew in my teens, and my mother made many of our family's clothing with her Singer sewing machine, I don't remember much mending.

Mending was not part of my way of being; my generation viewed mending as a signifier of poverty in that one could not afford to buy new. Presently, however, the tide has turned and the term “visible mending” is trending as a badge of honor. So how is it that I've moved from feeling shame at the thought of wearing mended clothing, to this present sense of deep satisfaction at accomplishing a small, funky mending of my favorite Darn Tough Vermont merino wool socks?

Kate Sekules (clothes historian, writer, mender), in an 8/26/21 Selvedge Magazine Newsletter article “Why Do We Mend?” states it best: “mending is coming back as more and more people understand the mess we're in with our metastasized fashion industry. It's insane to keep consuming. Creative interventions in the trillions of existing garments can keep us going for decades….we forget how incredibly valuable fabric always was, until not much more than a century ago, how universal was the need to preserve the precious resource.”

She goes on to note that “taking control of one's own wardrobe and relationship to fashion via visible mending is a link to one's deeper self, the freedom, the permission to play. Mending is also an art form—a scrappy one. It's extemporizing with cloth and thread, a creative, personal process that's way more than repairing.”

Thusly, when I look down at my foot and see the healed tear in my sock, the visible mending signifies courage and strength, a beauty mark even. A smartness and skill to extend life. A rebel even, against our over consumptive culture. My part in keeping a piece of clothing out of the landfill.

I'd love to hear if you've taken up mending, your history towards the skill, and what you're doing to battle the environmental ills of Fast Fashion.