A certain rhythm, a certain knowing

Transcription

1 University of Iowa Iowa Research Online Theses and Dissertations Spring 2015 A certain rhythm, a certain knowing Alexandra Katarina Janezic University of Iowa Copyright 2015 Alexandra Katarina Janezic This thesis is available at Iowa Research Online: Recommended Citation Janezic, Alexandra Katarina. "A certain rhythm, a certain knowing." MFA (Master of Fine Arts) thesis, University of Iowa, Follow this and additional works at: Part of the Book and Paper Commons

2 a certain rhythm, a certain knowing by Alexandra Katarina Janezic A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Master of Fine Arts degree in Book Arts in the Graduate College of The University of Iowa May 2015 Thesis Supervisors: Associate Professor Julia Leonard Lecturer Sara Langworthy

3 Copyright by alexandra katarina janezic 2015 All Rights Reserved

4 Graduate College The University of Iowa Iowa City, Iowa certificate of approval master s thesis This is to certify that the Master s thesis of Alexandra Katarina Janezic has been approved by the Examining Committee for the thesis requirement for the Master of Fine Arts degree in Book Arts at the May 2015 graduation. Thesis Committee: Julia Leonard, Thesis Supervisor Sara Langworthy, Thesis Supervisor Sara Sauers Sarah Kanouse

5 To all whom have helped me along the way. ii

6 a certain rhythm to be a certain knowing ob- serv- d to be re- mark- d Robert Lax Sea & Sky iii

7 acknowledgements I am grateful to those who have offered their generous guidance and support throughout my time at The University of Iowa: Thank you to Julia Leonard, Sara Sauers, Sara Langworthy, and Sarah Kanouse for your assistance with my artistic practice, particularly during the pursuit of my thesis. Thank you to all the faculty and staff at The University of Iowa Center for the Book for making my time here worthwhile and possible: Timothy Barrett, Julie Cobb Smith, Emily Martin, Craig Kelchen, Kathleen Tandy, Cheryl Jacobsen and Giselle Simon. Thank you to my all my Book Arts Colleagues: Matt Runkle, Andrea Kohashi, Radha Pandey, Leslie Smith, Steph Rue, Cody Gieselman, Candida Pagan, Elizabeth Munger, Eli Boyne, Mary Sullivan, Karen Carcia, Kalmia Strong, and many, many others whom I have not named here. Thank you to my family and friends for the love and support you have given me now and throughout my life: Teresa Janezic, Don Janezic, Vernelle Wiens, Gwendolyn Bland, Linda Buhyer, Dave Buhyer, Linda Beth Buhyer, Marilyn Horsch, Brian Horsch, Gloria Wiens, Ah-Ram Park, Sarah Murphy, Norene Chonka and Brittany Chonka. iv

8 public abstract An interweaving of text and image. v

9 table of contents list of figures vii introduction punctuated weaving conclusion bibliography vi

10 list of figures Figures 1. A Version of Myself. Archival Pen on Claybord Panel, 8 x A Red Line. Archival Pen on Claybord Panel, 8 x Typewriter Study: a Weaving. Typewriter Ribbon on Handmade Paper, ~11 x Study I. Letterpress print on Somerset Satin Paper, ~13 x Study II. Letterpress print on Somerset Satin Paper, ~13 x Study III. Letterpress print on Somerset Satin Paper, ~13 x Study IV. Letterpress print on Somerset Satin Paper, ~13 x Study V. Letterpress print on Somerset Satin Paper, ~13 x vii

11 INTRODUCTION In the summer of 2011 I began making marks, very small marks, marks that seemed to multiply and divide themselves, combining into larger forms. The marks began from my own loose idea of what a sand painting might look like, an attempt to grasp why I was so interested in such a culturally specific art form. At the time, weavings and spiritual traditions of Native American life contained imagery and techniques I looked to for guidance. The artifacts I was most interested in had complex geometric patterns, fibrous textures, and varying functions, such as weavings, baskets, and ceramics. These objects had been made for people of the culture to live with and envelope themselves in. On the more spiritual side of this, sand paintings are made as ceremonial creations, images made and meant to be destroyed after their making in efforts to heal. For me, this concept seemed liberating. It eased the pressure of making with the knowledge the object would be destroyed. Although I embraced this concept, I changed a rule. Instead of physically destroying, I would put the object I made in a drawer and forget about it; a mental rather than physical destruction. The first drawings were anywhere from six by six inches to nine by twelve inches in a few Strathmore sketchbooks. The forms created were amorphous in character, much like a bizarre grouping of appendages. When I started each piece I had no concept of what it would look like, the drawing independent of the need to be designed or premeditated. Each drawing took on a life of its own, forming itself under my hand, growing and taking over the page. In the process of figuring out what I was doing (and/or what these drawings meant), I decided to make a drawing that would catalogue a year of my life. It also happened to be one of the most difficult years of my life. The drawing served as a abstract timeline. Each phase of the year was visible in the conglomeration of forms, exhibiting the varying emotional characteristics I experienced in the quality of the marks. It was a valuable lesson in the ways of time. I continued to draw that year, all the while continuing to ask the same questions of myself. What am I doing? Why am I making? I came to realize each drawing contained imagery exhibiting qualities much in the spirit of weaving, particularly in relation to herringbone patterns and the use of my own organic geometry. In the midst of this questioning I found a poem: 1

12 black the warp & red the woof black the warp & red the woof red the woof & black the warp 2

13 red the woof & black the warp From the same poem: black black the warp tight tight the string red red 3

14 the woof of my love of my love Robert Lax, from Sea & Sky 1 This poem pointed out a constant I had been struggling to reckon with in my work. The simple ordering of the words is what initially drew my interest to this poem. This grouping of words arranged in this manner exactly described the process I had finally been able to identify as weaving. The line spacing felt similar to the way my hands and mind worked to construct a drawing. Each word a unit in a line. The poem is simple enough to be a mantra or meditation. It is apparent Lax does not question himself in these words, they are a distillation of thought: a methodical and deliberate expression of his emotions. My mind returns to this poem frequently, easing my own scrutiny of what I make, allowing for things to be as they are. Warp and weft, line by line. This is what making a mark drawing feels like. A repetition of what it feels like to be myself to be a physical, sentient being. I often write in my drawings. A drawing is a reminder and reinforcement of time, its existence and how emotions are a part of it. Sometimes there are words for these things. More often than not, what I have written later appears inherently flawed. At the time of writing, the words had been truth. A truth which invariably changes with time and experience. Many of the things written in my drawings strike me this way, glaring and hidden at the same time. 4

15 As I looked at what I was making I started to wonder what these objects could look like as printed drawings. I drew scratch negatives, made polymer plates and printed them. In the process, they lost all the qualities that made them living the parts that indicated a flawed but persistent human being had made them. I was given a typewriter. It had all the colors I cared about: black and red. The keyboard had symbols that resembled my own mark making. I hit keys, returned, and spaced. I could distantly hear the old tape recorded typing lessons I had been forced to listen to and obey in high school. Despite the mechanical nature of the process of typing, landscapes began to appear on the page. The drawings I was producing were the imprint of a human through the hand of a machine they maintained their humanity. These typed pieces had life to them, they had errors. The errors didn t look like errors to me, they looked human. Each drawing looked like a mixture of all the human errors that had ever been made and were intentionally left to be put together. 1 Lax, Robert

16 Figure 1. A Version of Myself. Archival Pen on Claybord Panel, 8 x

17 Figure 2. A Red Line. Archival Pen on Claybord Panel, 8 x

18 Figure 3. Typewriter Study: a Weaving. Typewriter Ribbon on Handmade Paper, ~11 x

19 PUNCTUATED weaving Inspired by drawing with the typewriter, I decided to make letterpress drawings as well. I settled on making an edition of five different prints based on my experiments with the typewriter. My intention in making prints involved the desire to imbue letterpress printing with a meditative property, to make a drawing of the physical time I spent printing. Using this method I sought to describe printing in its essence: repetitive movements resulting in a grouping of multiples. Each line was gradually moved down the bed of the press and printed until the page was filled. I was drawn to using only punctuation as I had realized that my drawings were made up of small marks, like an extended array of hyphens or hyphen-minuses. What did this mean? In the perspective of a hyphen, each mark was striving for continuity, the previous hyphen reliant on the last for its meaning. Punctuation symbols have meaning comparable to words. The variation in my drawn marks looked strikingly similar to other forms of punctuation as well: slashes, dashes, minus signs. I decided to draw with all of them. With the uniformity imposed by typefaces, the marks now lent themselves to being designed and reproduced. What does it mean to make a weaving? Weaving has traditionally been women s work a vital task before industrialization. In order to have clothing and warmth for one s family, women wove in order to provide basic necessities for human life. Some of the earliest woven garments discovered have patterns referencing the female form and fertility. A particular pattern refers to the actual anatomy of a woman, taking on the form of a lozenge shape in reference to the vulva. 2 The lozenge shape has its roots in early prehistoric cultures which has persisted up to today. 3 After reading about this, I realized some of my prints referenced this shape, despite my lack of intention. What was I getting at? Though I was not weaving for basic survival, I do believe it satisfies a basic spiritual need. Many of the most complex and labor intensive cloths have been made for spiritual and ceremonial purposes. Ethnographic parallels worldwide show that enormous time is often put into simply decorating people and things with efficacious symbols believed to promote life, prosperity, and safety. For example, many a Slavic folk costume is decorated with red embroidery at neck, sleeve, and hem. Both the designs and the blood red color carry symbolic life powers, while the potent signs are carefully located to ward off sickness demons that are looking for openings through which to attack. 4 9

20 While I myself am not trying to ward off sickness demons in a literal sense, I do believe I am trying to embody similar sentiments through color choice and composition. The color red is an important aspect of my work, and it is no coincidence that it is associated with symbolic life powers. Weaving was traditionally done in a group environment with multiple weavers. One typically needed assistance to string the warp of the loom and spin fiber for the large amounts of thread needed to compose one weaving. 5 I think it is appropriate that the punctuated weavings have been made in a print shop, a historically group-oriented environment. More interesting is the fact that the print shop has traditionally been the workplace of men, only recently becoming further populated by women with increased interest in book arts and letterpress. My own interests in women s work may have to do with understanding what it means to be occupying spaces which are historically male (letterpress), and how this relates and redefines the work that has been historically classified as female (weaving). The result of my efforts in punctuated weaving was movement: static lines of metal creating prints with the movement of fabric. The lines of metal type had been moving up and down the press bed the entire span of printing. One line of type was printed, moved, and reprinted to create each new layer of warp or weft. The resulting pieces are a complex timeline of decisions and movements. 2 Wayland Barber, Elizabeth Wayland Barber, Elizabeth Wayland Barber, Elizabeth Wayland Barber, Elizabeth

21 Figure 4. Study I. Letterpress print on Somerset Satin Paper, ~13 x

22 Figure 5. Study II. Letterpress print on Somerset Satin Paper, ~13 x

23 Figure 6. Study III. Letterpress print on Somerset Satin Paper, ~13 x

24 Figure 7. Study IV. Letterpress print on Somerset Satin Paper, ~13 x

25 Figure 8. Study V. Letterpress print on Somerset Satin Paper, ~13 x

26 CONCLUSION During the process of making Punctuated Weaving I have given a lot thought to what it means to be an artist and a craftsperson. The act of printing is intertwined with human material and cultural history, especially within the contexts of book printing and typography. What I have made involves the study of craftspeople before myself, those who have designed letterforms and decided their significance to our language. In contrast, weavings are imbued with other cultural meanings, those having to do with labor and love in the service of improving the lives of others. I have studied artists like Anni Albers, who made typographic weaving samples as one of the many points of departure for my own work. I am greatly indebted to the people who have informed the creation Punctuated Weaving with what they have made. As I have been thinking about my indebtedness and my own creative process, I found a passage by Edgar Allen Poe in reference to his own artistic efforts and feelings about creativity. Although it is in reference to his detective genre stories, it holds some resonance in describing how I feel about making: These tales of ratiocination owe most of their popularity to being something in a new key. I do not mean to say that they are not ingenious but people think them more ingenious than they are on account of their method and air of method. In the Murders in the Rue Morgue, for instance, where is the ingenuity of unravelling a web which you yourself (the author) have woven for the express purpose of unravelling? 6 We get quite a sense of Poe s ego in this, and by no means do I think I am ingenious but I do agree with him about the idea of unravelling. This quote describes how I have felt making this project, grappling with the idea of ingenuity. How can a project be considered creative when it has been heavily premeditated and indebted to the work of artistic predecessors? Has Punctuated Weaving been creative when I have been unravelling a web which you yourself have woven for the express purpose of unraveling? What I have realized is that the joy in making this project was the unraveling. Although I set up a great deal of parameters to work within, I really had no idea what Punctuated Weaving would ultimately look like. I used the same tools and ideologies as my predecessors, yet despite this I could not know the final outcome until the project was finished. I am indebted, but I understand that it is a part of being a per- 6 Poe, Edgar Allen

27 son in the future, with the privilege to see what has happened in the past. I am thankful to the artists and craftspeople who have paved the way, and if they have taught me but one thing, it is that we all unravel at our own rates and our own terms, and we all do it differently. 17

28 BIBLIOGRAPHY Barber, E. J. W. Women s Work: The First 20,000 Years: Women, Cloth, and Society in Early Times. New York: Norton, Lax, Robert, and John Beer. Poems ( ). New York: Wave Books, Text: Edgar Allan Poe to Phillip P. Cooke August 9, 1846 (LTR-240). Edgar Allan Poe Society of Baltimore. Accessed March 26,