I make these aprons and garments from manipulated and stitched paper primarily because of the connections they make with the tradition of hand and home made articles by anonymous women of the past, my grandmother included. I feel motivated to turn something traditionally thought of as craft (and sometimes not given serious thought) into an article that was made using many of the same materials and processes yet is not a functional item. The conversations that go along with that, including what makes a piece work as either craft or art or both, are interesting.

I have used paper for sewing because it is a common drawing support but not conventionally considered to be a sewing material. In this way, it seems that there is a traditional fine arts medium being used in what may be considered to be a craft format. The paper is treated with wax in an encaustic method in order to make it more translucent as well as stiff enough to hold a shape. Typically, I make the work in a different size than it normally would be, putting it further into a realm between function and non function. A few of the pieces are not made of paper, but of materials like drier sheets. The material is chosen for the associations it has. Through out the construction of the work, I am very interested in the repetitive quality of the processes involved in making these pieces, from ironing paper, waxing it, stitching or printing individual parts of the work and then sewing together the entire piece. This is both meditative and a comment on the process of labor.

Imagery and technique are chosen based on personal experiences, issues that are pressing in my life or situations that I want to resolve for myself.  Garments have been selected as the base for the work because I want the pieces to be related to histories and sometimes stories of women and children. My grandmother was an alterations seamstress for a large department store when I was growing up which influences some of the work. Other pieces are comments about the tools that we all use, things from a jigsaw to a rolling pin. I am most interested, actually, in the stories that people who see the work are reminded of in their own lives.