Mindful and Meaningful: Exploring the Synergetic Relationship of Textile Waste and Fine Art Practice

I'm excited to share with you a special evening event of artist lead conversations, cocktails, and hors d'oeuvres at the historic Helms Bakery District Design Center hosted by Textile Arts Los Angeles.

Join us on Wednesday, January 29th, from 7:00 - 9:30pm for Mindful and Meaningful a panel discussion featuring presentations by fiber artists whose works utilize recycled or repurposed materials.

I will be discussing the synergetic relationship of textile waste and fine art practice alongside fiber artists Aneesa Shami and Chuck Hohng. Together we will explore the many ways in which artists and designers can work together to create a more sustainable future.

Aneesa Shami

Chuck Hohng

Renae Barnard

Wednesday, January 29th

7:00 - 9:30pm

HELMS DESIGN CENTER

8745 W Washington Blvd

Culver City, CA 90230

Mindful and Meaningful: Exploring the Synergetic Relationship of Textile Waste and Fine Art Practice

Artists and Designers can work together to create a more sustainable future. Three Los Angeles based artists share their diverse practices and individual experiences, creating responsible objects that honor the past and endure in the future.

Chuck Hohng is a Korean American artist, born in Long Beach California. Chuck spent fourteen years of his early life in his family's native South Korea. He received his undergraduate degree in Fine Arts from the University of Southern California and received his Master of Fine Arts degree from Art Center College of Design. His early childhood exposure to Catholic practice and a bicultural household furthered interests in vanitas, identities, symbols, and rituals. Chuck makes a range of fiber artworks from teddy bears to haute couture hanbok. Exploring salvaged textiles connections to love and loss, Chuck's artworks give a physical body to intellectual and emotional experiences. He believes we can always grow out of the mud, lift ourselves above the murky water and bloom. www.chuckhohng.com

Aneesa Shami received her Bachelor of Fine Arts degrees in both Fiber and Art History from the Kansas City Art Institute. Aneesa's work speaks to a broader understanding that we are all fundamentally human. She tries to utilize universal themes that are inclusive, referencing the sublime, and an otherworldly sense of the human conscious and subconscious. A love for repetitive mark-making drives her practice. Multiple strands of yarn, strips of felt, and even pen strokes build depth and density in each piece. Layers of material and process combine to lend the impression that there is more than what the eye sees. She recently completed a residency at the Helms Design Center, is currently researching textile and fiber history and is completing large sculptural pieces in her current body of work, Syndication. www.aneesashami.com

Renae Barnard is a multi-disciplinary artist interested in exploring the network of interactions between environment, perception, and well-being. Using found materials and waste from the furniture manufacturing industry, Barnard received her Master of Fine Arts from Claremont Graduate University and her BA from California State University, Los Angeles. Barnard has recently completed projects in cooperation with the National Immigration Law Center and the City of Santa Monica Department of Cultural Affairs. She is a recipient of the Sue Arlen Walker and Harvey M. Parker Memorial Fellowship, the Armory Center for the Arts Teaching Artist Fellowship, The Ahmanson Annual Fellowship, Lincoln Fellowship Award, and Christopher Street West Art and Culture Grant. www.renaebarnard.com

Mindful and Meaningful Preview at Textile Arts Final 2019 Textile Slam

Textile Arts Los Angeles held the final installment of their Textile Slam Series at the Helms Bakery Design Center in Culver City. Renae Barnard presented a preview of her program, Mindful and Meaningful: Exploring the Synergetic Relationship of Textile Waste and Fine Art Practice with artists + panelist Chuck Hohng and Aneesa Shami.

A transcript of Renae’s presentation follows here.

Hello, my name is Renae Barnard.

 This evening we will be discussing the critical relationship, between art practice and the ever evolving and pre and post-consumer waste stream.

In this brief presentation, Aneesa Shami, Chuck Hohng and I will share a bit about our process and practice in the hopes that you may be inspired to join us in creating a more sustainable future. 

 Like most artists, I came to using recycled materials from financial necessity, supplemented by my personal commitment to environmental responsibility and a willingness to embrace unlikely possibilities.

Looking to my surroundings for materials has been a long-standing part of my practice.

During my undergraduate studies I attempted (usually successfully) to stitch together any and all fibrous materials I could get my hands on.

 Yesterday’s newsprint, a failing electric blanket, photocopied chapter notes, and discarded tracing paper all found new purpose.

Biblical tracts thrust into my hand by a stranger became garments for Precious moments dolls, allowing the interaction, and its triggering of childhood memories, to prompt a re-contemplation of what it meant to be an unwilling juvenile member of an evangelical church.

In graduate school I began drawing on the waste of others.

 Bits and bobs of ribbon, yarn, thread and elastics from friends and family members projects became foundational materials for my soft sculptures.

At present, I’m utilizing the waste of the furniture manufacturing industry to create the sculptural foundations of my work.

 This material is otherwise unusable, too small of scraps to be repurposed within the mills directly.

 Foam supplemented with cotton and polyester fiberfill scraps is built up on a wood panel with wheat paste with weeks and sometimes months of waiting between layers.

A completed 4’x 6’ sculpture utilizes more than 50 pounds of furniture manufacturing waste material, reducing the ever-growing stress on our landfills.

 While there are many avenues to responsible art practice, Aneesa, Chuck and I have found that regularly partnering with designers of textiles and furniture, manufacturers and consumers is a best practice in building mutually beneficial relationships that support our art practices and our environmental commitments.

 Please join us for a full-length presentation exploring our sourcing practices, studio life and in-depth project details on January 29, 2020. A formal announcement from Textile Arts LA is forthcoming! Thank you

Special Dinner Event: Textile Slam!

I'm excited to share with you a special evening event of artist lead conversations, cocktails, and dinner at the historic Helms Bakery District hosted by Textile Arts Los Angeles.

Join us on Tuesday, October 29th, from 6:30 - 9pm for Textile Slam! a community conversation featuring presentations by artists, designers, architects and educators to talk about their work, ideas that interest them, or projects they are exploring.

I will be discussing the synergetic relationship of textile waste and fine art practice alongside fiber artists Aneesa Shami and Chuck Hohng. Together we will explore the many ways in which artists and designers can work together to create a more sustainable future.
I hope to see you there!

Tuesday, October 29th

6:30 - 9:00pm

HELMS DESIGN CENTER

8745 W Washington Blvd

Culver City, CA 90230

Mindful and Meaningful: Exploring the Synergetic Relationship of Textile Waste and Fine Art Practice

Artists and Designers can work together to create a more sustainable future. Three Los Angeles based artists share their diverse practices and individual experiences, creating responsible objects that honor the past and endure in the future.

Chuck Hohng is a Korean American artist, born in Long Beach California. Chuck spent fourteen years of his early life in his family's native South Korea. He received his undergraduate degree in Fine Arts from the University of Southern California and received his Master of Fine Arts degree from Art Center College of Design. His early childhood exposure to Catholic practice and a bicultural household furthered interests in vanitas, identities, symbols, and rituals. Chuck makes a range of fiber artworks from teddy bears to haute couture hanbok. Exploring salvaged textiles connections to love and loss, Chuck's artworks give a physical body to intellectual and emotional experiences. He believes we can always grow out of the mud, lift ourselves above the murky water and bloom. www.chuckhohng.com

Aneesa Shami received her Bachelor of Fine Arts degrees in both Fiber and Art History from the Kansas City Art Institute. Aneesa's work speaks to a broader understanding that we are all fundamentally human. She tries to utilize universal themes that are inclusive, referencing the sublime, and an otherworldly sense of the human conscious and subconscious. A love for repetitive mark-making drives her practice. Multiple strands of yarn, strips of felt, and even pen strokes build depth and density in each piece. Layers of material and process combine to lend the impression that there is more than what the eye sees. She recently completed a residency at the Helms Design Center, is currently researching textile and fiber history and is completing large sculptural pieces in her current body of work, Syndication. www.aneesashami.com

Renae Barnard is a multi-disciplinary artist interested in exploring the network of interactions between environment, perception, and well-being. Using found materials and waste from the furniture manufacturing industry, Barnard received her Master of Fine Arts from Claremont Graduate University and her BA from California State University, Los Angeles. Barnard has recently completed projects in cooperation with the National Immigration Law Center and the City of Santa Monica Department of Cultural Affairs. She is a recipient of the Sue Arlen Walker and Harvey M. Parker Memorial Fellowship, the Armory Center for the Arts Teaching Artist Fellowship, The Ahmanson Annual Fellowship, Lincoln Fellowship Award, and Christopher Street West Art and Culture Grant. www.renaebarnard.com

Love > Shelter: S.C.R.A.P. Gallery's Art of the Shack + Smithsonian Museum Day

There’s No Place Like Home

So said Dorothy Gale, famously, in The Wizard of Oz. Nothing could be truer.

No matter the address, from mansion to humble dwelling - urban to rural, it’s more about individuality, determination and soul. The Art of the Shack, explores and celebrates the concept of home and is inspired by the work of American artist Beverly Buchanan (1940-2015) who was influenced by the sharecropper shacks she experienced in the Deep South and the do-it-yourself builders and architects around the globe.

Opening on Smithsonian Museum Day and developed by the S.C.R.A.P. Gallery and the Coachella Valley Art Center, The Art of the Shack showcases work incorporating reused and recycled materials.

Love > Shelter. 14”W x 16”L x 8”D. Found Alderwood scrap, wire hangers, yarn, water based paint, magnesium sulfate (2019).

Renae Barnard’s sculpture, Love > Shelter will be on view in The Art of the Shack exhibition at S.C.R.A.P. Gallery. This work was inspired by the Bowerbird’s use of construction and ornamentation as courtship and considers the ways in which beauty, presentation, and perception influence romance, opportunity, and acceptance. Recycled and found materials such as Alderwood scrap, wire hangers, and yarn are used to create the structural form. A combination of water-based paint and magnesium sulfate creates the colorful crystalline covered surface texture.

A detailed look at the crystalline textured surfaces in Love > Shelter.

The S.C.R.A.P. Gallery is an innovative program that addresses two of today’s most urgent issues – the environment and the education of our youth. Conservation and reuse through hands-on exploration with discarded materials is promoted at the S.C.R.A.P. Gallery. Arts and science workshops help students understand complex environmental issues. Materials donated by local businesses and manufacturers are available for reuse by teachers, artists and community programs.