Amanda Blake

Marginalia Chic (1)

This series is a consideration of notions of bodily containment that I am exploring throughout my work. I constantly turn to textiles as a material because of our, as humans, ongoing relationship to it. Aside from, or because of, the way we utilize fabric to adorn and define ourselves, as we wear clothing, we are consistently in passive contact with it. I wanted to reference moments where that contact is not passive and we feel actively uncomfortable with the fabric on our bodies, trying to evoke the feeling of bursting out of this containment or this effort to define oneself. The pattern and color is meant to read as more grounded, playful and almost childlike and what can be seen underneath is more of the same fabric. Which is to say, though this containment is uncomfortable, it is not malicious. What is contained and what is containing are the same, though the discomfort is still present. This also, when contextualized on a stretcher like a painting, is working within the art canon, considering the moments of discomfort, or feelings of failure in making art.