Sunday 8 May 2016

I'll knit you one

If asked to sum up Peru in three words and phrases I bet most people
would say something like - Incas, llamas and woolly hats with earflaps.
But if you said Ana, Teresa, Barboza I'd be most impressed.


I don't know whether Ana Teresa ever uttered the words "I'll knit you
one."; they probably don't translate quite like that from her native
Peruvian, but she should have because that's what her art is mostly about.
Ana Teresa knits landscapes.


Although that's not strictly true because knitting is only a part of it.
She weaves dreams, mimics the flow of water and grasses, makes the sky
move, brings the hills alive and all with just yarn, wool and needles.
She also does some rather dark, slightly disturbing stuff but I promise
I won't go there in this episode.


Ana Teresa was born in 1980 in Lima where she lives and works today
having studied painting in the Faculty of Art at the Pontifical Catholic
University.  Her work occupies the space between sculpture and tapestry
and her images break effortlessly free from their constraining embroidery
hoops to tumble naturally down the walls on which they are displayed.

Starting to get a bit spooky.

Her pieces also cross the invisible boundaries into textile are where she
mixes threads with graphite on cloth with consumate ease.  When she
first left university she dabbled in clothes design which is where she learned
about fabrics and their construction and it is this knowledge that she
incorporates into her masterpieces today.

Embroidered photograph

She sees her creations as a fusion of textile art and feminine art through the
mixture of vegetable fibres and synthetic threads with drawings and even
photographs.  A truly unique approach and I'm waiting patiently to see her
marvels up close should she ever decide to exhibit in my neck of the
woods - knitted ones, of course!


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