Looking for Fiber-Based Work on The Subject of Motherhood

Seeking examples of work in fiber-based media on the topic of motherhood for a paper to be delivered at the 2012 Textile Society Conference in Washington, D.C. Artist Kate Kretz will be delivering a lecture entitled "The Final Art Taboo: Identity Politics of Motherhood".

Female artists have gained some ground over the past few decades, but there are still unspoken rules remaining: artists who happen to be mothers tend to keep it quiet lest they be written off, and heaven forbid they make art on the subject. While art historians have always studied and noted the influence of travel, friends, and milieux on the work of male artists, the most profound and life-altering experience of all has been ignored in these discussions of creative inspiration, because it is an exclusively female phenomenon. This paper will feature work done by cutting edge contemporary textile artists who have artistically “come out” as mothers, addressing the topic with humor, depth, and sometimes, shocking candor. Fiber, a medium that references protection, nurturing, and other motherly attributes, serves as the perfect vehicle for art evoking the complex nature of contemporary motherhood.

Please email website links or up to 3 jpeg images to kkretz4art@aol.com by March 31st.

Kate Kretz earned a certificate at The Sorbonne and a BFA at the State University of New York at Binghamton before receiving her MFA from University of Georgia.

Exhibitions include the Museum of Arts & Design, Van Gijn Museum, Kunstraum Kreuzberg, Wignall Museum, Katonah Museum, Frost Museum, Fort Collins MOCA, Telfair Museum, Fort Lauderdale Museum, the Museo Medici, as well as Lyons Wier Ortt & 31Grand Gallery in NY, Chelsea Galleria and Hardcore Art Contemporary Space in Miami, and Packer/Schopf in Chicago.

She has received the NC Arts Council Grant, The South Florida Cultural Consortium Fellowship, The Florida Visual Arts Fellowship, and a Millay Colony Residency. After working as an Associate Professor and BFA Director at Florida International University for ten years, she recently moved to the Washington, DC, area. Kretz currently works in her studio while giving workshops and lectures at various universities.

Her work can be seen at http://www.katekretz.com, on Flickr, and Facebook.

My newest piece will be finished in a day or two. It's really personal, so I have no idea if it's art, just know that it something that I needed to make to complete a certain internal cycle in my life. I will probably have to write a brief sentence and come out of the closet about a difficult issue in order for it to make sense to people and not seem like a pile of sentimental rubbish.

This has been a really fun and challenging piece to make in terms of solving problems and pushing the limits of the materials. It is a big sacrifice career-wise to make one piece and move on to something completely different, as opposed to creating an inventory of almost-identical pieces... I think about that all the time, as it pushes hard against my ambitions, but I can't work any other way. Life is too short.

My newest silverpoint is featured in the exhibition "From What I Remember / From What I Forget" at The Principle Gallery in Alexandria, VA. It is a really lovely show that focuses on representational work, most of it obsessively rendered.

"Tempest", 2011, tarnished silverpoint on found spoon, 1.5 x 5.5 x 1"