The Weft and Warp of It

I am not a weaver. I have never woven a blanket, shawl, or tapestry, though I admire those who have the knowledge and ability to do so. Too often, I forget which way the thread or yarn goes on the loom: weft (transverse) and warp (lengthwise). It’s embarrassing because there’s a connection to weaving in my family’s history. My father once told me that his father was involved in the textile industry in Łódź, Poland, a city once considered the Manchester of Eastern Europe. But more than a hundred years ago, my paternal grandfather wasn’t a weaver either, as far as I know. Rather, his expertise was to peer through a loupe at a piece of cloth and discern how the pattern had been woven so a loom could be set up to reproduce it.

Textile factory equipment, Centralne Muzeum Włókiennictwa. Source: poland.travel/en/lodz/industrial-lodz/

So it’s no wonder that I was duly impressed by “More Impact: Climate Change, Tapestry Weavers West,” currently at the San Jose Quilt & Textile Museum until January 2, 2022. It is another example of how artists of all media are keenly feeling and expressing their disquietude regarding the current circumstances we face. They also reveal their joy in the grandeur of Nature. While the theme of the exhibition points out the disasters, the beauty of the artworks invites us to take a closer look and appreciate the sensitivity and skillfulness behind them.

Gingko, A Living Fossil (2021), by Patti Kirch. wool and linen on wool warp.

Curated by Bay Area weavers Deborah Corsini and Alex Friedman (who was our gracious exhibition guide), “More Impact” features tapestries in a variety of techniques and styles that reflect our changing global environment and the injurious fallout of those changes. Organized by the Textile Arts Council (Fine Arts Museums, San Francisco), the tour exposed us to fiber art that is both lovely and unsettling, as well as to how certain effects are achieved in the diverse weavings.

Svalbard: Melting Glacier (2021), by Minna Rothman.
wool, silk, linen, on linen warp.

According to Minna Rothman, one of the northernmost human settlements in the Arctic is the Svalbard archipelago. As temperatures have risen, a melting glacier creates a creek and floods an area that was covered by ice for centuries. In turn, the terrain becomes a lichen-covered plateau, as Rothman illustrates in Svalbard: Melting Glacier.

New Antarctic Landscape (2019), by Jennie Lee Henderson. natural colored hand-spun wool on linen warp.

Jennie Lee Henderson also considers the effect of warming trends on glaciers and ice shelves. Her tapestry represents how the Antarctic landscape might well appear in the not too distant future: “ridges and valleys and jagged rock outcroppings colored by subtle earth tones.”

Vanishing… (2020), by Sue Weil.
wool, cotton, and Tencel; cotton seine twine (warp); tapestry, soumak, wrapping

Another weaver who speaks to this issue is Sue Weil. Vanishing…, her abstract depiction of warming seas and glacial melt, is “a personification of loneliness, the portrayal of a once monumental form, now diminished and adrift in the sea.” In the detail below, raised areas add to the highly textured feeling of the piece.

Detail of Vanishing… (2020), by Sue Weil.

Sharon Crary addresses the tragedy of glaciers breaking apart during our lifetime in a work that undulates and bulges rather than hanging straight and flat against the museum wall. Breaking Apart, Breaking My Heart conveys how glaciers “push, grind, scrape and roll huge rocks along in front, to the side and underneath.” Although her tapestry does not mimic sounds, Crary imagines glaciers groaning, creaking, snapping, and explosively booming once great chunks of ice crash into the water.

Breaking Apart, Breaking My Heart (2019), by Sharon Crary. cotton, wool, silk, acrylic, metallic yarns; wedge weave and eccentric weave

One more piece harbors the same concern about this unexpected phenomenon. It is the latest in Janette Gross’s series about melting glaciers and icebergs. It, too, communicates a sense of isolation. I can picture a polar bear sitting on top, slowly starving as it clings to the remaining ice.

The Last Iceberg (2020), by Janette Gross.
indigo dyed wool, silk, plastic, cotton, on wool warp; wedge weave with slits, card woven selvedge

Serious rises in temperature have led not only to melting and flooding, but also to more extreme and frequent fires. Several of the weavers visually discuss this occurrence, sometimes as acute personal loss.

Climate Change in California (2019), by Marcia Hanson Ellis. wool and metallic; cotton warp

For her entry in the exhibition, Marcia Hanson Ellis submitted a tapestry about the 2017 Tubbs fire in Santa Rosa, California. Fire temperatures were so elevated that most of the 4600 plus homes that were destroyed were reduced to the fine ash that remains after a cremation. Thus, the words woven into the piece: “On Monday my home was cremated.” And twenty-two people were killed. Severe drought and winds led to dire consequences.

Is This the Way It Will End? (2020), by Jenny Heard.
wool, linen, synthetics on cotton warp

There is an ominous inkling of dread and anxiety in Jenny Heard’s tapestry. She asks: “Will the world end in a drought as water sources dry up and skeletons become part of the landscape? Will the stench of rotting fish and decomposing flesh fill the dusty air that makes the beginning and end of the day indistinguishable?” It’s the kind of scene none of us wants to envision for our future and that of coming generations.

Detail of Is This the Way It Will End? (2020), by Jenny Heard.

Deborah Corsini’s Fire Season is an abstraction of a burning landscape. Her intention in using these particular colors is to capture the intense heat and power of flames as well as the toxic pollution of particulate matter in the atmosphere.

Fire Season (2020), by Deborah Corsini. wool on cotton warp; wedge weave tapestry

Along with environmental destruction comes extinction. As forests burn, as glaciers melt, as ocean temperatures rise, all kinds of species are dying or trying to find ways to adapt to their degraded or disappearing habitat. In Witnessing, Yonat Michaelov offers images of whale, mountain lion, and golden eagle as symbols of life in the ocean, land, and air. She adds the masked face of Jane Goodall observing and wondering whether we will act to find solutions to the problems we, the human species, have foisted on the planet.

Witnessing (2020), by Yonat Michaelov.
wool weft on cotton warp

As we already know all too well, it is not just rising temperatures to blame for decimation of marine life. Plastic plays a huge offending role because it attracts birds and sea creatures searching for food. Micro debris particles even enter human bodies. For Dis-Charge, Alex Friedman cut up an accumulation of plastic credit cards to represent our society’s “careless and excessive material consumption which has contributed to the alarming degradation of our oceans.”

Dis-Charge (2018), by Alex Friedman. wool, cotton, PVCA, cut-up cards

Detail of Dis-Charge (2018),
by Alex Friedman.

While I cannot include all the pieces in the exhibit, I want to close with one more. It is a small weaving that the artist created with a feeling of “calm, strength and hope for the future.” It was inspired by a spontaneous trip Martha Lightcap took during a break in the COVID pandemic. She explains that the positive emotions came as a result of spending days “crossing our vast western landscape, feasting on amazing peaks, colored canyons and endless sunsets on some of the loneliest roads imaginable.”

Corona Moon (2020), by Martha Lightcap.
wool, on cotton warp

Questions & Comments:
If you are a weaver, do you recognize the various techniques used to create particular effects? Do you use them as well?
What artwork (visual, literary, musical, sculptural, etc.) have you created that addresses environmental issues and/or celebrates the glories of our natural world?
How do you think art about climate conditions can make a difference? Does art really have the power to change minds?