Pierce, Pull, Piece
By Hand Gallery
Exhibit Dates: October 7–November 11, 2022
Opening Reception: October 7th from 5–8 pm
Pierce, Pull, Piece is presented at By Hand Gallery and features the stitched and felted textiles of David Joseff Sloma with an opening reception on Friday, October 7th, from 5–8 pm for Gallery Walk, Bloomington.
This current body of David Joseff’s expressive artworks, Pierce, Pull, Piece, illustrate language and meditation as “stitch”. Started on January 1st, 2022, the work is formed with handmade felt, hand-dyed yarns, threads, and fabrics. These stitched vessels and panels speak to David’s unique aesthetic sense of nature—each stitch is at once auditory, tactile, and visual. The experience of these meditative processes is the genesis for Joseff’s creations and are the inspiration for this collection’s title.
For David Joseff, the work starts with a seed and grows, cultivating it with the inspiration found in his use of natural materials. He individually selects the wools and vintage/found fabrics, hand dyes his yarns and threads, wet wool felts, needle felts, embroiders, and quilts his multi-faceted pieces.
Each step of the process is a meditative meandering. The base layer often is created through wet wool felting— a process of agitating wool fibers with hot water, soap, and friction that interlock the fibers among themselves to create his foundational panels and vessels. Onto and into this, he repetitively pierces a barbed, felting needle that introduces layer upon layer of roving and yarns. The artist’s intuitive use of embroidery stitches unites each work with threaded lines that allude to map-making and time-marking as they traverse through his beautifully conceived abstractions.
This collection builds on David Joseff’s decades of work of creating a felt sense of nature through design. After a formal education in architecture, he has explored design thinking through printmaking, landscaping, metal working, designing residential interiors, and now through fiber work. In each media that he explores, David Joseff imbues natural elements into the very structure of his work.
By Hand Gallery is a locally owned, cooperative gallery that currently has 12 artisan members. By Hand Gallery has been in the Bloomington community for over 30 years and has a reputation for selling art works that are of superior design and quality artisanship. Besides our cooperative members, there are over 70 artists who sell their work through By Hand Gallery.
The exhibit is free and open to the public.
WHERE:
By Hand Gallery, Inside Fountain Square Mall
101 W Kirkwood Ave, Suite 109
Bloomington, IN 47404
812.334.3255
Hours: Monday – Saturday 10:00am – 5:30pm; Sunday 12:00 – 4:00pm