Escape Suit by Gary Graham
Gary Graham
Escape Suit
November 20 — December 22, 2023
Prairie Gallery presents Escape Suit, a solo exhibition by New York fashion designer and artist Gary Graham. This new body of work was imagined and assembled during Graham’s two-week residency at Prairie and is an extension of his work in fashion. According to Graham, “the Prairie residency offered me an opportunity to approach my drawing and design interests in a more direct – pencil to canvas – way, without the burden of production considerations shadowing my process and subconscious.”
Inspired by select transferware objects, including a Staffordshire teapot, Graham inverted, interpreted, and tessellated three-dimensional elements into two-dimensional patterns on 19 cotton and linen canvases to create the work. He worked directly on handmade canvases, using materials such as graphite, beeswax, turmeric, and ash to create layers and washes of abstract, lyrical motifs. Different surface treatments, evocative of memory, antiquity, and impermanence, inhabit each suit pattern. By framing individual pattern pieces, each piece becomes as important as the finished suit would be on its own.
Escape Suit expands upon Graham’s knowledge of historical textiles, fabrics, and finishes, although it appropriates that imagery in a different, more narrative way. The installation is based on a character he encountered during previous work at the historic Old Manse in Concord, Massachusetts. This unnamed protagonist constructs his own lexicography of ornament based on found or stolen treasures as he creates his Escape Suit to accompany him on his journey. Also presented in the exhibition are relics and keepsakes from the protagonist’s excursions, including a suit of armor crafted of tufted antique French linen, as well as some of the objects that inspired the motifs and embellishments featured in the installation.
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