CatharineClarkGallery

Commissioned by the Columbus Museum of Art, Ohio, Pattern Migration responds to the museum’s extensive collection of 19th century American coverlet (blanket) weavings and entwines multiple production processes to address the friction between globalized factory production and artisanal craft.

 

Syjuco, interested in the aesthetic conventions of modern capitalism and consumer goods, worked with three contemporary weavers in the U.S. and in Europe (Peggy Hart, Erika Hanson, and Travis Meinolf) to produce three new textiles that mimic the distinctive plaid pattern that typically adorns cheap, mass-produced plastic travel bags.

 

Subsequently, a set of hand-sewn replica Chinese bags were made from Syjuco’s new woven coverlets, disrupting the divergent areas of high culture and commercial production and reflecting on the history of textile production and anonymous labor and their ever-shifting relationship with the object’s marketplace value. Commonly used around the world, these bags are hallmarks of the globalized spread of objects as well as migrant communities.

 

Finally, working with a Chinese factory, Syjuco produced five kilometers worth of plastic woven fabric, this time embedded with an intricate starburst pattern that was originally developed by a 19th century American weaver. The quantity of the fabric represents the minimum order that could be placed, reflecting the massive scale of factory production today. Visitors to the exhibition were able to take yardage from this fabric and were encouraged to make new “products” with it, thus continuing the cycles of production.

Together, the works in Syjuco’s Pattern Migration close the loop between handmade and mass-produced object, forming a strange hybrid of disparate production processes.

Commissioned by the Columbus Museum of Art, Ohio, Pattern Migration responds to the museum’s extensive collection of 19th century American coverlet (blanket) weavings and entwines multiple production processes to address the friction between globalized factory production and artisanal craft.

 

Syjuco, interested in the aesthetic conventions of modern capitalism and consumer goods, worked with three contemporary weavers in the U.S. and in Europe (Peggy Hart, Erika Hanson, and Travis Meinolf) to produce three new textiles that mimic the distinctive plaid pattern that typically adorns cheap, mass-produced plastic travel bags.

 

Subsequently, a set of hand-sewn replica Chinese bags were made from Syjuco’s new woven coverlets, disrupting the divergent areas of high culture and commercial production and reflecting on the history of textile production and anonymous labor and their ever-shifting relationship with the object’s marketplace value. Commonly used around the world, these bags are hallmarks of the globalized spread of objects as well as migrant communities.

 

Finally, working with a Chinese factory, Syjuco produced five kilometers worth of plastic woven fabric, this time embedded with an intricate starburst pattern that was originally developed by a 19th century American weaver. The quantity of the fabric represents the minimum order that could be placed, reflecting the massive scale of factory production today. Visitors to the exhibition were able to take yardage from this fabric and were encouraged to make new “products” with it, thus continuing the cycles of production.

Together, the works in Syjuco’s Pattern Migration close the loop between handmade and mass-produced object, forming a strange hybrid of disparate production processes.

An ongoing project, at present consisting of over 200 postcards, where various elements in the image are connected by stitching through the card with red sewing thread. The cards are then grouped, and the groups are then connected via an elaborate network of dotted red lines made of graphic tape applied to the wall. A "world view" of extreme and almost paranoid interconnectedness emerges. As with many of my map works and chart pieces, the project seems to suggest some underlying coherent research or guiding principal, but the piece ultimately speaks more about taxonomy itself.
 
Each time the project is exhibited, Katchadourian incorporates postcards from the city or town where it is on view so that people can recognize a local point of entry. This project began as a response to a long layover with a postcard purchase from a gift shop in the Olso airport in 1998.

An ongoing project, at present consisting of over 200 postcards, where various elements in the image are connected by stitching through the card with red sewing thread. The cards are then grouped, and the groups are then connected via an elaborate network of dotted red lines made of graphic tape applied to the wall. A "world view" of extreme and almost paranoid interconnectedness emerges. As with many of my map works and chart pieces, the project seems to suggest some underlying coherent research or guiding principal, but the piece ultimately speaks more about taxonomy itself.

 

Each time the project is exhibited, Katchadourian incorporates postcards from the city or town where it is on view so that people can recognize a local point of entry. This project began as a response to a long layover with a postcard purchase from a gift shop in the Olso airport in 1998.

An ongoing project, at present consisting of over 200 postcards, where various elements in the image are connected by stitching through the card with red sewing thread. The cards are then grouped, and the groups are then connected via an elaborate network of dotted red lines made of graphic tape applied to the wall. A "world view" of extreme and almost paranoid interconnectedness emerges. As with many of my map works and chart pieces, the project seems to suggest some underlying coherent research or guiding principal, but the piece ultimately speaks more about taxonomy itself.

 

Each time the project is exhibited, Katchadourian incorporates postcards from the city or town where it is on view so that people can recognize a local point of entry. This project began as a response to a long layover with a postcard purchase from a gift shop in the Olso airport in 1998.

An ongoing project, at present consisting of over 200 postcards, where various elements in the image are connected by stitching through the card with red sewing thread. The cards are then grouped, and the groups are then connected via an elaborate network of dotted red lines made of graphic tape applied to the wall. A "world view" of extreme and almost paranoid interconnectedness emerges. As with many of my map works and chart pieces, the project seems to suggest some underlying coherent research or guiding principal, but the piece ultimately speaks more about taxonomy itself.

 

Each time the project is exhibited, Katchadourian incorporates postcards from the city or town where it is on view so that people can recognize a local point of entry. This project began as a response to a long layover with a postcard purchase from a gift shop in the Olso airport in 1998.

An ongoing project, at present consisting of over 200 postcards, where various elements in the image are connected by stitching through the card with red sewing thread. The cards are then grouped, and the groups are then connected via an elaborate network of dotted red lines made of graphic tape applied to the wall. A "world view" of extreme and almost paranoid interconnectedness emerges. As with many of my map works and chart pieces, the project seems to suggest some underlying coherent research or guiding principal, but the piece ultimately speaks more about taxonomy itself.

 

Each time the project is exhibited, Katchadourian incorporates postcards from the city or town where it is on view so that people can recognize a local point of entry. This project began as a response to a long layover with a postcard purchase from a gift shop in the Olso airport in 1998.