More Air-like than Water
Left: Untitled, (triangle twills) 2018, digital print on archival paper, 36” x 48”
Right: Net Values 1, 2018, Net Values 2, 2018, 21” x 42”, Cotton, paper, nylon, handwoven on TC-2 Loom
Fuller Sampler, 2018, Size variable, metal blinds, paint, waxed kevlar
Left: Fuller Sampler (detail), 2018, metal blinds, paint, waxed kevlar
Right: Heart of Being 3, 2018, 41” x 21.5 x 4” , Cotton, polypropylene cord, nylon, wool, handwoven on TC-2 Loom
Gradient Slippage, 2018, 35.5” x 26”, Cotton, polyester thread handwoven on TC-2 Loom
Untitled, 2018, 34.5” 44” x 8”, paint, housewrap
Twill Babies, 2018, 6"X 36"x 46", Ink jet print,, digitally printed linen
Untitled, 2018, 19.5” x 18”, paint on housewrap
The work presented in More Air-like than Water, explores the deep meaning in geometry and abstraction as they relate to textile and graphic design vocabularies. Fairbanks approaches weaving, painting, photography and sculpture with a playfulness of process that destabilizes conventional value systems of hard and soft form-making while digging into more philosophical understandings of material vs immaterial.
The viewer is asked to consider object as photo, photo as pattern, pattern as dimensional; confronted simultaneously with macro and micro, foreground and background, disorienting the viewer as they search for a focus. While the work fights for perceptual attention, it also encourages a deep engagement with our material world in the construction of philosophical belief systems and physical realities.
