ANNA PEDERSON / JULY 2017
Anna Pederson is an artist from Minneapolis, Minnesota earning her Bachelors of Fine Arts degree in Textiles from the Rhode Island School of Design in 2018. She is interested in the semiotics of textiles and the ways in which we receive certain cultural cues from fabrics. Her objective in studio is to subvert this "language" of textiles and clothing through sculptural objects in a similar way that words are subverted through jokes or poetry. These objects combine and juxtapose found fabrics in an attempt to re-locate their various signals.
STUDIO WORK
During her month at The Weaving Mill, Anna worked with found fabrics to create soft sculptural objects. Presented as prototypes for a usable objects, the sculptures gestured towards the functional elements of a bureau, a bookcase, a clothing rack. These sculptures function as their forms imply, but Anna’s use of overstuffed, misplaced soft edges conjured a sense of danger or suspicion.
WORKSHOPS WITH ENVISION UNLIMITED
Anna worked with Envision clients to create stuffed soft sculpture forms. Envision artists worked on drawing, cutting, tracing, editing, pinning, stuffing, and sewing. The project began with a drawing exercise, creating original shapes which were translated into cardboard pattern pieces. Participants recombined the cardboard shapes into larger, unexpected forms which were used as the cutting patterns for the soft sculptures. People sewed and stuffed these flat forms into three-dimensional pillow/soft sculptures.
