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Danielle Lasker

Lecturer

Bio

Danielle Lasker (they/them/theirs) currently serves as the inaugural Joan Livingstone Director of the Textile Resource Center at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. They received their MFA in Fiber & Material Studies from SAIC and their BFA in Fabric Design from the University of Georgia. They are a weaver working with themes of queerness, folklore, and how the two become one through the workings of the loom.

Exhibitions

Danielle has exhibited work with the Toe River Arts Center, ARC Gallery, SITE Gallery at SAIC, Sandra J. Blain Gallery at Arrowmont School of Arts and Crafts, Lamar Dodd School of Art at UGA, Clara M. Eagle Gallery at Murray State University, and others.

Portfolio

Courses

Title Department Catalog Term

Description

The class will examine the many possibilities of creating woven forms using a tapestry loom (also called a frame loom). Students will begin by experimenting with the basic techniques of tapestry and plain weave as they explore ways of creating surface, image, texture and various color effects within a woven form. Students will then learn more complex tapestry weaving techniques. A variety of tapestry looms will be considered, including possibilities for constructing looms of varying dimensions and sizes. Contemporary weaving projects, along with historical references, will be presented through discussions, visual presentations, demonstrations, readings, and close-up examinations of woven textiles. This course is open to all levels.

Tapestry works by contemporary artists such as Diedrick Brackens, kg, Erin M. Riley, Terri Friedman, Aiko Tezuka, Josh Faught, Julia Bland, Sarah Zapata, and Erasto ?Tito? Mendoza will be shown, together with seminal works by artists whose tapestry works spurred the emergence of the field of fiber in the 1950s through early 1970s: Trude Guermonprez, Anni Albers, Lenore Tawney, Olgs de Amaral, Tadeusz Beutlich, and Magdalena Abakanowicz. Contemporary frame loom weaving will be contextualized through visual presentations and readings exploring relevant histories of weaving across the Americas, Asia, Africa, Europe, and the Middle East, together with examples of present day weaving workshops and institutions like the Museo Textil de Oaxaca (Mexico), the Centro de Textiles Tradicionales del Cusco (Peru),the Manufacture Nationale des Tapisseries Senegal (Senegal), and Sadu House (Kuwait).

Course work will vary but typically includes the creation of woven samples, 3 or 4 finished works, reading responses, and short research assignments and/or presentations.

Class Number

2139

Credits

3