Sheila Hicks: Weaving as Metaphor
2006
Published by Yale University Press21.8 x 15.6 cm417 pagesHardbackISBN 9780300116854
This book examines the small woven and wrought works artist Sheila Hicks has produced for the past fifty years. With their distinctive colours, thoughtful compositions and narrative, these miniature creations reveal the emergence and continuity of the artist’s approach to her work. Internationally recognised for her mastery of a textile vocabulary of extremely different scales, Hicks has thoughtfully crafted miniatures throughout her nomadic career. The palm-sized works present a record of her remarkable and personal journeys.
Focusing on some 100 miniatures from public and private collections, the book demonstrates the breadth of Hicks’s concerns: her persistent inquiry into the mysteries of colour, her playful yet reverential subversions of weaving traditions, her surprising range of materials and her exploration of new technology. From initial experiments based on pre-Columbian weaving structures to a 2005 sculptural project using ninety colors of synthetic filaments, these small works offer a unique opportunity to access and examine the artist’s conceptual and technical forays.
The volume includes informative essays by Arthur C. Danto, Joan Simon and Nina Stritzler-Levine, as well as illustrations of the artist’s working tools, related drawings, photographs, and chronology.