Sheila Hicks
in ‘Subversive, Skilled, Sublime: Fiber Art by Women’, Renwick Gallery of the Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington
31 May 2024 – 5 January 2025
Sheila Hicks, The Principal Wife Goes On, 1969, linen, silk, wool and synthetic fibers,dimensions variable, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of S.C. Johnson & Son, Inc., 1977.118.2A-F4
Sheila Hicks is included in ‘Subversive, Skilled, Sublime: Fiber Art by Women’ at the Renwick Gallery of the Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington.
Showcasing thirty-three artworks, this exhibition pieces together an alternative history of American art, exploring the way fibre handicrafts have long provided a source of inspiration for women. The artists included took up fibre to complicate its historic marginalisation and revolutionise its import to contemporary art. They drew on personal experiences, particularly their vantage points as women, and intergenerational skills to transform humble threads into resonant and intricate artworks.