Summer Group Show

HB381 is pleased to announce our summer exhibition, a group show of three Nordic artists emphasizing the parallels between intensive hand crafts, traditional textile techniques, and ceramics. The show will run from June 24th to August 19th at the gallery’s New York location in Tribeca. Recent works by Marianne Huotari (Finnish, b. 1986), Veera Kulju (Finnish, b. 1975), and Hanne G. (Danish, b. 1963) are to be included.

Sewing, mending, stitching: all refer to “handicrafts” that have bred deep textile traditions and patterns for creation. The three featured artists pull on that history, transposing textile and handicraft techniques to the medium of ceramics, as they darn sculptures and glaze tapestries. By foregrounding repetitive and detail oriented practices, they each pause hectic daily life to invite in a therapeutic pace that centers creating by hand.

The hundreds of beads and medallions required in Marianne Huotari’s works pass individually through her fingers before they are sewn onto a metal frame with wire. The beads ruffle and layer at will, quilting themselves. Huotari references the Finnish textile technique of ryijy, meaning thick cloth, where a loom is used to weave tapestries featuring geometric shapes and florals. Colors traditionally ranged from gray and white, to red, yellow, green and blue once plant dyes were introduced. Her palate stays true to this precedent, while she continually experiments with materiality and composition.