Fiber Artist Barbara Schneider
"My ongoing interest in the Japanese concept of Wabi-Sabi, finding beauty in things that are imperfect, impermanent and incomplete is at the core of all my artwork. I try to capture the essence of images made of light and movement, images that are in infinitely variable. What does the eye see? What does the camera see" What does the mind see"
My Leaves series is an exploration and interpretation of natural images by enlarging and reshaping them. I collect leaves, pods, flowers, grasses and look closely at their structure and shape. In particular, I like to collect these natural objects at the end of summer when they have begun to wither and fragment. Enlarging them in my work process allows me to see them as sculptural objects. I look at the play of light upon surfaces and shaping the pieces introduces a new element-light and shadow interacting with the undulating surfaces."
In the first week of July this year Barbara Schneider spent a week in my workshop in Greenville New York at Hudson River Valley Art/Fiber Workshops. It was an incredible group of woman who gathered to learn and experiment with digital printing alternative surfaces. The artist's present were like sponges with the plethora of material thrown at them and the results were many awesome alternative prints. Barbara was no exception as we printed one of her leaf images on several substrates.
One of the things I loved was the time we had (the workshop was 5 days) as I was able to spend a nice bit of time with everyone in the workshop while their images printed which included time with Barbara, her surfaces and images. When you start to experiment with alternative surfaces a great place to start is trying the same image on the various substrates. When you switch images you don't really get an overall view of what can happen in printing the variables. Above you can see Barbara's image on many substrates. Of course it is always hard to see in pictures, but the textures and impact of the image can still be seen. Barbara made some notes about precoats and surfaces as she worked.
(If you click on the images you will be able to see more detail in the print)
With her fiber art, Barbara has developed 2 processes that she uses to create her leaf pieces. These processes and some background on how the concept developed and fits into her overall aesthetic is the content of her new DVD "Three-Dimnesional Fiber Art: Shape & Texture, Light & Shadow"just released. You can view a snip of her dvd on the same page here.
You can visit Barbara's website to see more of her work. It's worth a visit to see her different series and the scope of her work.
It was wonderful to meet and work with Barbara Schneider. Her work is interesting, her attention to detail is inspiring and it's exciting to see her DVD first hand!
