Clothing as Artistic Expression
Many artists that I follow use clothing as a means of artistic expression. The fabrics and materials with which they choose to work are very diverse ranging from horse hair to metal, and the processes are also multifaceted; crafts such as sewing, embroidery and knitting as well as industrial applications. Two of my favorites, Annette Messager and Louise Bourgeois both have worked with clothing because of their psychological, social, political and gender connotations as well as their shapes, colors and textures.
Bourgeois said that when she was growing up “all the women in the house were using needles…the needle is used to repair damage. It’s a claim to forgiveness.’
Louise Bourgeois, Untitled, 1996
Messager reflects on memory through language and her choice of materials and their manipulation. For example, she has frequently used dresses, embroidery, fabrics, stockings, veils, fishnets – all connected to femininity. The Story of Dresses expresses the essence of womanhood, but it does so with a half smile, with an eye for overdoing things.
Annette Messager, The Story of Dresses, 1990
The dress has influenced many of my works some more literally than others. Layers is an interpretation of a dress I saw in a display window at Colette in Paris.
The dress as my inspiration, Layers is a deconstructed dress form reconstructed into an unexpected new shape, layered with hand-stitched images, Asian textiles and text. I laugh that so many of my pieces reference a dress because my mom couldn’t get me to wear a dress if her life depended on it. Give me a great pair of jeans any day.
Marilyn Stevens, Layers, 2006
