The Three Graces series happened from a need to find figures to draw from, for my bird woman series. On a visit to the Baltimore Museum of Art, I discovered Dirk de Quade van Ravesteyn ’s “The Three Graces”, dated 1590-1612, and it spoke to me in numerous ways. This was the artwork that  my first piece “The Three Healing Graces” is based on.  The historical symbolism of the three graces varies from a number of positive and uplifting emotions, values and qualities that I wanted for my bird women. 

In “The Healing Three Graces” , I included the bird heads of  the Ruff, the barn owl and the Allen Hummingbird. Each bird represents a quality of joy, beauty and confidence.  “The Fighting Three Graces” uses the heads of , the California Quail , the Northern Flicker and the Eskimo Curlew. These birds represent birds that are literally fighting for their existence due to climate change. I used freehand machine embroidery for the bodies and added hand embroidery for the heads.

These works feature my bird women interacting with the scenes found in decor toile fabrics. The toile scenes  reference back to man's gradual  pilfering of our the natural land.  This is where my bird warriors come to educate, watch over and fight for their future. 

With this series, I am again using freehand machine stitching with black thread for the figures on cotton or organza and then I am using hand embroidery to add color, details and form to the birds and bird heads of the figures. 

This series is based on contour line drawings I did of my high school students when I taught  art at a Baltimore County High School over the 30 years. These were part of a series of Paintings that I created back in 2005, and were the last series of paintings that I did before transitioning into a fiber artist. “Watch Children” are my current renditions of these paintings. These teens are bored and tired of having to take over their new task of watching over important environmental specimens . I have played with a variety of bird heads, pattern backgrounds, props and the precious seeds and pollinators needed for our Eco system to continue and for their bird lives to thrive. Each piece features freehand machine stitching ,to imitate my ink drawings, a variety of fabrics for texture , overlay and pattern

My bird women first came as a reaction to the Alexander McQueen’s show : “Savage Beauty”, at The Metropolitan Museum of Art in the summer of 2011. This show did not affect me right away. I had to go see the show again at the Victoria and Albert in London in 2015. Still not emerging in my work. Not even in my sketches, but that duck wing dress, I could not forget. The incorporation of animal parts in his headdresses and dresses could not escape my mind. I remember my first thought , “ If I wore that I could do anything," like a super woman, a fighter.

Then 2016 happened along with the Trump administration and my world got rocked with constant news blast  and mistrust of my government. Watching the rights of my fellow human beings getting stomped on while environmental protections were snuffed out! I needed strength to fight this evil power, and the bird woman emerged from that vision of Alexander McQueen. I kept seeing myself with an added uniform of wings and helmet at the end of my yoga routines when I would envision my younger self staring back at me. These are the pieces that  grew from this period of rage.  My new characters and plants play and interact within the scenes of the toile and decor fabrics. I’ve used a variety of materials to stitch on, depending of its opaqueness and color. Fabrics range from vintage barkcloth to organic cotton to felt. 

Figures in thread have been a focal point for my work since my first piece “Girl with Bird” in 2014. I was doing figure drawing during an open studio session at Maryland Institute ,College of Art to keep my drawing skills up to snuff. I have always enjoyed drawing the figure and using the female figure as my vehicle of communication.  It was only natural for me to challenge myself with stitching the figure on my sewing machine. 

“Lost in Collaboration” is the first piece that felt like home to me. It captured the layers that I used when I painted.  Having the figures and birds collaborate with the pattern background revived my painter past of painting wallpaper backgrounds as my ground, adding layers of line work with color shaping in and out with playful levels of opaqueness of paint , now translate in fabric and felt. 

The two studies of woman based on Works by Richard Deibenkorn are my first works that incorporate felt into the background for color. 

A series drawings of  plants found in native and planned gardens in the UK as well as the US.  These are my ink drawings from observations that I use for my freehand machine stitched drawings on felt. I started to use these as part of my bird women pieces and pillows, decor pillows, wall pieces and accessories. I am currently working on a new series of accessories ( zipper and eye glass cases) that feature medicinal and symbolic plants and herbs that are beneficial to our planet as well as ourselves. 

“Hanging Them Out to Dry” is about man’s  influenced on climate change through everyday life activities. The embroidered birds represent a wide range of birds that are on the sliding scale of endangerment: the Piping plover  to the Boat-tail grackle,  the American Woodcock to the Mourning Warbler, the Brown Pelican to the Upland Sandpiper. Stitching them all from hand was done as a  dedication as well as an act of preservation. The vintage napkins, as well as the clothesline, were selected for their function and history. We have traded in the health of our earth for our convenience.  

This is the first work of art that exclusively features my hand embroidery.  Thanks to a course at Penland School of Craft  titled "Stitching as Drawing", I had been updated beyond my pre-teen experience of stitching embroidery kits on long road trips. I was amazed that I did remember most of the stitches.  Now the "kit" is of my own design, with the mission of rendering  living birds. I had to go back to my painting knowledge and color theory to figure out the art of blending colors with thread. Stitching is definitely a three dimensional act and a color thread stitched with or next to each other can blend and make new colors.

To photograph this piece, I took them out to New Germany State park, to find a place that I could install  to bring it to life. I really have to admit there is something amazing about seeing them in this beautiful environment that truly brings them  to life. I plan on adding more birds, with a kingfisher in progress , as well as find new places to install them. 

"Hanging them out to Dry", was originally created for the show : "Unnatural Causes, an Exhibition  about Climate Change and Biodiversity Loss" that was to be at the Charles Mansion in Baltimore, MD,  for the spring of 2020. It has been postpone indefinitely due to the COVID-19 crisis.  Hopefully it will happen at the Peale Center some time in the near future. 

In 2017, I turned my little 3” hoop bird portraits into a larger family that became my ancestors in my piece “The Genealogy of My Imaginary Family”. This piece was to fill a case that was in the Peale Museum for the “Birdland and Anthropocene” exhibit.  My family tree was made up of 13 freehand machine-stitched bird portraits, ranging in sizes from 3” to 14,"  canvas stretched circular hooped birds portraits resembling a genealogy tree of human personalities. 

I selected a variety of native birds that range from the familiar to the extirpated breeds in Maryland. I wanted them to feel like family portraits, arranged to create a narrative of subtle expressive reactions and silent dialogue. Each portrait is created freehand on the sewing machine. Drawing each mark, value and detail by manipulating the canvas under the moving needle. Each has a final result of a line drawing but with a more labor intensive method that I chose as a dedication towards their preservation.   

I've continued to add more to my "family" throughout the year. My portraits evolve from shape and  size, ruff to helmeted guineafowl, profiles to full body, black thread to color.

My bird portraits have become quite popular with a number of bird lovers who are now purchasing and collecting them. You can see all of my bird portraits here on my online shop. 
Check out the show  here for the Birdland and the Anthropocene catalogue 
  

Covid 19 Mask Project

A series of images that illustrate moments during the height of the Coronavirus. Images are transferred onto cotton then manipulated with hand embroidery.  Each of these have been converted into a mask, which just seems to be the best symbol to represent COVID- 19 in America where the Mask has become as politicized and controversial to our continual divide under the Trump administration.  Since I am talking about social and political current events I have used photographs from various news publications to manipulate. 

My exploration of overlaying lines began in the early nineties. I loved how David Salle made us look through images to discover a new dialoged. I also was highly influenced by his use of juxtaposition. In these early paintings, I was doing a lot of soul searching and reaching out for my vocabulary.  Borrowing most images from childhood textbooks and found imagery. I would project and play with textures, overlaying images and color. I loved painting the projected line. I found it to be quite meditative even when labor intensive. I used this technique through most of my painting career. Finding many similarities in my fiber work. Drawing the traced line, overlaying the lines over the pattern and color shapes of fabric and felt. 

More paintings can be found here: https://www.flickr.com/photos/jennyjen42/albums/72157603807985083