Fiber Arts in Current Exhibitions
By Laura Heyrman
“Threads were among the earliest transmitters of meaning.” – Anni Albers (German-American, 1899-1994)
Fiber and textile arts are having a big moment in museums and galleries around the US and internationally, as the long list of current and upcoming shows below suggests. This explosion of exhibitions can be seen as a response to the number of artists using fibers and fabrics in contemporary art. The artists working in fiber arts, in the past and today, come from a wide variety of personal and cultural contexts. Some are continuing ancient traditions of their cultures; others are seeking unique materials to convey new ideas.
The acceptance of these media can be traced in part to the development of feminist art in the 1960s. The goal of many feminist artists was to break down the old hierarchies that had dismissed these artforms as craft and women’s work. Even before the 60s, though, various artists sought to incorporate weaving, embroidery, and fabric design into Modernist art. Some important names in this earlier era are Gunta Stölzl and Anni Albers of the German Bauhaus movement, Sonia Delaunay who co-founded the Orphism movement with her husband and had a long career in fabric and fashion design, as well as in painting, and Sophie Taeuber-Arp who was active in Dada and other artistic movements in the first half of the 20th century. Taeuber-Arp created the small embroidered piece that opens this slide show around 1918, probably as a pattern sample or design for a larger tapestry. However, she then placed it in a much larger gilded frame, as if to assert its value as an independent art object. The artists who have followed in her footsteps would understand that impulse.
Another important force in the growth of fiber arts in contemporary galleries and museums is the increasing prominence of artists of indigenous descent from all over the world. For these artists, traditions often serve as a base to which innovative approaches can be added. Shan Goshorn, an artist of the Eastern Band Cherokee, learned traditional basketry techniques and then used printed and painted paper instead of the usual materials. She considered her baskets a “non-threatening vehicle” with which she could teach lessons about her culture and its history. Guatemalan weaver and translator Hellen Ascoli uses a traditional backstrap loom but incorporates garments, fragmented textiles, and words woven into her works to explore the storytelling potential of her weaving.
The works that I have included in this slide show demonstrate a variety of materials and techniques, yet they are only a tiny slice of what artists are accomplishing using these formerly dismissed media.
Below is a list of some current and upcoming fiber arts exhibitions, including those represented by works in this slide show, but if you know of others, please share them in a comment on Substack. irequireart.substack.com/p/viewing-room-37/comments
(listed in order of closing date)
“Madalena Santos Reinbolt: A Head Full of Planets,” until Sunday May 25, 2025. American Folk Art Museum, 2 Lincoln Square, New York, New York, USA. folkartmuseum.org/exhibitions/madalena-santos-reinbolt-a-head-full-of-planets
“Laura Lima: Balé Literal (Literal Ballet)” through May 30, 2025. Tanya Bonakdar Gallery, 521 West 21st Street, New York, New York, USA. tanyabonakdargallery.com/exhibitions/854-laura-lima-bale-literal-tanya-bonakdar-gallery-new-york
“Hana Miletić: Desire Lines” through June 21, 2025. Magenta Plains, 149 Canal Street, New York, New York, USA. magentaplains.com/exhibitions/hana-miletic
“Tanya Aguñiga: Weighted” through June 21, 2025. Albertz Benda, 515 West 26th Street, New York, New York, USA. albertzbenda.com/exhibitions/135-tanya-aguiniga-weighted
“Summer Winter: Margaret Roach Wheeler” through June 30, 2025. Zane Bennett Contemporary, 435 South Guadalupe Street #2, Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA. zanebennettgallery.com/exhibitions/43-summer-winter-margaret-roach-wheeler/overview
“Bamboo Masterworks by Fujitsuka Shōsei” through July 4, 2025. Eskenazi, Ltd, 10 Clifford Street, London, England, UK. eskenazi.co.uk/en-gb/exhibitions/bamboo-masterworks-by-fujitsuka-shosei
“Sublime Light: The Tapestry Art of D.Y. Begay” through July 13, 2025. National Museum of the American Indian, National Mall, Fourth Street and Independence Avenue, SW, Washington DC, USA. americanindian.si.edu/explore/exhibitions/item
“Verkenning: Igshaan Adams” through July 25, 2024. Casey Kaplan Gallery, 121 West 27th St, New York, New York, USA. caseykaplangallery.com
“Hellen Ascoli: The World Upside Down” through August 1, 2025. International Studio and Curatorial Program, 1040 Metropolitan Avenue, Brooklyn, New York, USA. iscp-nyc.org/event/59364
“Woven Histories: Textiles and Modern Abstraction” until September 13, 2025. Museum of Modern Art, 11 West 53rd Street, New York, New York, USA. moma.org/calendar/exhibitions/5733 This exhibition debuted at the Los Angeles County Museum in 2023.
“Olga de Amaral” through Oct 12, 2025. Institute of Contemporary Art Miami, 61 NE 41st Street, Miami, Florida, USA. icamiami.org/exhibition/olga-de-amaral A version of this exhibition appeared at Fondation Cartier pout l’art contemporain, Paris, in late 2024-early 2025. I Require Art’s Viewing Room 25 featured this artist: irequireart.substack.com/p/viewing-room-25
“Sanaa Gateja: the Language of We” through Nov 2, 2025. ICA Miami. 61 NE 41st Street, Miami, Florida, USA. icamiami.org/exhibition/sanaa-gateja-language-of-we
“Routed West: Twentieth-Century African-American Quilts in California” June 7-November 30, 2025. Berkeley Museum of Art and Pacific Film Archive, 2155 Center Street, Berkeley, California, USA. bampfa.org/program/routed-west
“Anni Albers. Constructing Textiles” November 11, 2025 – February 22, 2026. Zentrum Paul Klee, Monument im Fruchtland 3, Bern, Switzerland. zpk.org/en/ausstellung/anni-albers
Please share your comments and questions on Substack. irequireart.substack.com/p/viewing-room-37/comments
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