By Nina Heyn – Your Culture Scout
“Art does not solve problems but makes us aware of their existence. It opens our eyes to see and our brain to imagine”. ~ Magdalena Abakanowicz
In 1962, a young woman submitted her abstract Composition of White Forms, woven of earth-colored cotton yards, for a competition at the first Tapestry Biennal in Lausanne. This competition entry launched the career of a unique mixed-media artist, and it helped to change the status of textile works from “craft” to “textile art.” That artist was Magdalena Abakanowicz, a fiery young noblewoman from eastern Poland (with ancestry tracing all the way back to a certain Genghis Khan) who liked to use wool yarn, sisal rope, and other industrial fibers in a way that Western artists—raised in the long tradition of tapestry as a flat wall covering that mimics a painting—could not even approach. Her monumental fiber surfaces (kilims? tapestries? gobelins?) were like nothing ever created before.
This is great – can’t wait to show my daughter who in her unique way is an artist and started at a very early age. Started with pastels to ink, then creating enhanced photo albums with all sorts of materials, and creating her own clothes. She now grows her own flowers (which is a creation in itself) to create flower arrangements at 62 years of age. I will also add she drew (as a young girl) her own round house which she now lives in. Thank you.