AMY MEISSNER
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PechaKucha.

4/1/2016

24 Comments

 
This afternoon at the Studio Art Quilt Associates (SAQA) conference in Philadelphia, 24 artists participated in 3 rounds of PechaKucha talks. No, not a Chupacabra, not a puh-chaw-kuh-chaw, not a pitchy kookie, not a picky kackie ... a PechaKucha.

(A concise way of presenting, which allows each speaker only 20 slides, shown for 20 seconds each. After your last slide, you shut up, sit down and let the next speaker speak).

The experience was moving, vibrant, inspiring and I'm thrilled to have been a part of it. Many thanks to Maria Shell for her persuasion and hard work putting it together.

​My PechaKucha talk is below and clicking on an image will take you to other posts related to the work featured, its process/history or sister pieces. If you've never visited my blog before, this might be a good introduction.

*     *     *

In Defense of Doilies: An Artist's Relationship to Materials.

Amy Meissner, textile artist | From the post PechaKucha | www.amymeissner.com/blog/pechakucha
 
My name is Amy Meissner. I'm an artist in Anchorage, Alaska. My work explores fear and loss, motherhood, womanhood, and the fleeting quality of memory. While I don't always work in the quilt form, I do hold intention to work within the boundaries of abandoned cloth.
​
Amy Meissner, textile artist | From the post PechaKucha | www.amymeissner.com/blog/pechakucha

I come from Scandinavian women. I am the 12th first-born daughter to a first-born daughter, a line extending to 1642. My son severed this lineage; if born a girl, that daughter would've been the 13th.

​I don't know what kind of inheritance that would have been, but I know mine.
​
Amy Meissner, textile artist | From the post PechaKucha | www.amymeissner.com/blog/pechakucha

​
Part of my relationship to cloth comes from a heritage steeped in making. Of bent necks, rough hands and stabbing needles. Swedish women have sent me linens my entire life -- I filled a trunk with doilies, tea towels and pot holders. Unwanted -- by me-- for the most part.
​
Amy Meissner, textile artist | From the post PechaKucha | www.amymeissner.com/blog/pechakucha
 
But when I had children, I sensed a shift. My living questions encompassed thoughts like, "How do I escort my daughter into womanhood with grace and joy and strength?"
​
"How have my own experiences shaped me as a mother?"

Amy Meissner, textile artist | From the post PechaKucha | www.amymeissner.com/blog/pechakucha

"How do I gather the tools I still need -- to get it right?"
​
​To have a relationship with one's materials is to be open to the narrative power of voice. Not just your own echo, but in my case, open to the ghosts of prior generations, who still have something to say. 

Amy Meissner, textile artist | From the post PechaKucha | www.amymeissner.com/blog/pechakucha

Whether or not you want to hear it. 
Whether or not you think it pertains to you.
​Whether or not it is "contemporary."
​Or even beautiful.
Because an artist's job isn't to make people feel good, it's to make people think.
​
Amy Meissner, textile artist | From the post PechaKucha | www.amymeissner.com/blog/pechakucha

Materials are persistent, demanding you question their use if you are to find the heart of a piece. Have you questioned your materials lately? Can you say what you need to in another medium? Why use cloth when paint or wood or paper may be the better entryway? I ask this all the time. 

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​
​In Mary Karr's book, "The Art of Memoir," she writes: "One can't mount a stripper pole wearing a metal diving suit." That visual is worth remembering, so I'll repeat it: "One can't mount a stripper pole wearing a metal diving suit."

​So, what does she mean?

Picture

Don't wear armor for a job that requires one to be naked, raw and vulnerable in order to seduce an audience. Also, you're going to need all your muscle strength to hang upside down from a pole so get rid of all the extra shit you're hauling around.

​Or, figure out how it can support you.
​
Amy Meissner, textile artist | From the post PechaKucha | www.amymeissner.com/blog/pechakucha

For me, this meant embracing a heritage I often found confusing and foreign in ways beyond language and custom. 
I spent a lifetime shoving linens in a trunk, so turning to them with joy hasn't been easy or even visually interesting at times.
​​
Amy Meissner, textile artist | From the post PechaKucha | www.amymeissner.com/blog/pechakucha

In my defense, the 12-year old me didn't want a table runner for her birthday, or embroidered tea towels for Christmas ... again. I associated these items with disappointment, with a family's unwillingness or even failure to really know me.
​
Amy Meissner, textile artist | From the post PechaKucha | www.amymeissner.com/blog/pechakucha

These were the outpourings of distant Nordic women on the other side of the world, whose warmth towards me I questioned the few times we'd met. I didn't understand that their love was held in the physical act of making. That this was a vital way to nurture.
​
Picture

Perhaps they thought filling my trunk would prepare me. But, for what?
Early mornings at a stove? 
Late nights hand washing, starching, ironing and mending?
​I'd been taught to navigate the domestic realm, but I didn't want to then and don't want to now.
​
Amy Meissner, textile artist | From the post PechaKucha | www.amymeissner.com/blog/pechakucha

Ironically, this is exactly what I'm doing. Laundering these items late night, slithering around my stripper pole, confronting questions of mortality and fear and disappointment and loss. Circling and circling until I  find the entryway. Until I find the voice.
​
Amy Meissner, textile artist | From the post PechaKucha | www.amymeissner.com/blog/pechakucha

Another irony, is that I am being sent more domestic linens now than ever before. Through my recent crowdsourcing effort called the Inheritance Project, I've received packages from all over the world -- England, Canada, Sweden, Australia, the US -- people are considering the history of cloth, judging its weight, then letting it go.

​Sending it to Alaska. To me.
​
Amy Meissner, textile artist | From the post PechaKucha | www.amymeissner.com/blog/pechakucha

And I am accepting and shaping it. I'm holding the time, the material, the work it took someone to create something from nothing. For every maker I can name, there are 20 or 30 items that come labeled "Unknown." Same with origin, same with circa.

​Inheritance. It's a weighty thing.
​
Amy Meissner, textile artist | From the post PechaKucha | www.amymeissner.com/blog/pechakucha

And it's forced me into a correspondence and documentation effort that far surpasses the time I have available, but this is an integral part of the work I'm compelled to do right now. The handwork of the past and the lingering hum of history simply become another material. 
​
Amy Meissner, textile artist | From the post PechaKucha | www.amymeissner.com/blog/pechakucha

​And I know it's the right material, because I continue to ask myself if so. And also because of its persistent nature. The raw material continues to arrive at my door, along with stories from strangers, about strangers. And I keep circling, looking for the entryway, considering the living questions.

Amy Meissner, textile artist | From the post PechaKucha | www.amymeissner.com/blog/pechakucha

I'd always thought it was funny to force a man -- in from the field and starving -- to wade through a sea of doilies to get to his hot dinner. But here's that last irony. At 6:00 I hear the side door open, the scrape of shoes and my husband say, "Ugh, what's all this laundry stuff hanging everywhere? --Wait -- is that lingerie?"*

Amy Meissner, textile artist | From the post PechaKucha | www.amymeissner.com/blog/pechakucha

To breathe new life into the discarded is to hold a deep relationship with materials. Even if it means confronting vulnerability, questioning beauty and becoming a vessel for the work and time of others.

Even if it means defending your past, defending memory, defending doilies.

​Thank you for listening.

*      *     *
​
*Now, a quick note--my husband would actually never say this...although he did admit to thinking briefly that a certain red batch of doilies looked an awful lot like some really sexy stuff hanging there. No, what he always says, without fail, is this:

(Insert his version of a Swedish accent) "Oh. So many beautiful things."

What a guy.

​
24 Comments
Deborah Boschert
4/1/2016 08:06:34 pm

I feel so lucky to have heard you present today.

Reply
Amy Meissner link
4/4/2016 09:51:07 am

Deborah,
I am so thrilled to have gotten to know you this week, and equally honored to call you a friend. Thank you.
XO
Amy

Reply
judy martin link
4/1/2016 08:18:26 pm

Dear Amy
You are awesome. You can write, you can think, you are, I believe, doing something very important with your life. Congratulations on all you have achieved. xo

Reply
Amy Meissner link
4/4/2016 09:53:03 am

Judy,
Thank you for being such a catalyst and consistent inspiration to me. In the next life, we will be neighbors. My love to your family.
XO
Amy

Reply
Michelle
4/1/2016 10:51:38 pm

As always, I enjoy reading about your work as much as seeing it. Enjoy Philly!

Reply
Amy Meissner link
4/4/2016 09:53:56 am

Thank you for being such a constant presence, Michelle. I value our friendship.
XO
Amy

Reply
Natalya Aikens link
4/2/2016 04:12:17 am

Thank you so much for posting this! I wish I could have been there in person....

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Amy Meissner link
4/4/2016 09:55:15 am

Natalya,
As the only recipient of a teeny tiny RED doily, you would have had a place of honor in the room for sure.
XO
Amy

Reply
Liz link
4/2/2016 04:21:47 am

The toughest prof in my grad school experience was the one who assigned a series of papers each limited to one side of one page. That was when I learned how to edit myself (a lesson I'm still learning, by the way).

I thought of that experience as I read and looked through your post. What a great experience, seeing how you distilled the essence of your life and work into this highly polished presentation.

Kudos yet again!

Reply
Amy Meissner link
4/4/2016 10:01:57 am

Thank you so much Liz, I appreciate that in a sea of blogs, you still read mine. Distillation and culling of words, ideas, things ... all so important to clear the path for clarity ... but still so difficult to do.
XO
Amy

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Mo Crow link
4/2/2016 07:14:46 am

well said and love your sense of humour!

Reply
Amy Meissner link
4/4/2016 10:03:35 am

Thank you Mo. It's always great to read your words/hear your imagined voice here.
XO
Amy

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chawne link
4/2/2016 08:04:27 am

It was a real treat to get to hear you speak. Your work is amazing!

Reply
Amy Meissner link
4/4/2016 10:04:52 am

Chawne,
It was such a pleasure to hear/see your PechaKucha presentation as well! I'm very moved by the work you do.
XO
Amy

Reply
roxanne lasky link
4/2/2016 03:09:20 pm

I am sorry to have missed this, but it is so powerful that it translates perfectly in your voice from the written word. You are an art prophet and an icon for all of us.

Reply
Amy Meissner link
4/4/2016 10:07:29 am

Roxanne,
You were definitely with us in spirit and were missed deeply. While I don't know if I'm all you claim, I do know I take my friendships very seriously and I get the feeling that you do as well. I'm honored to count you as one.
XO
Amy

Reply
Ruth Briggs
4/3/2016 06:20:35 am

Thanks.....

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Linda McCurry link
4/3/2016 07:07:12 am

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Lorie McCown link
4/4/2016 06:46:16 am

Damn straight, chica.

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Amy Meissner link
4/4/2016 10:09:25 am

Lorie,
The great thing is...now I know exactly what you sound like saying that. I'm so grateful for our time together.
XO
Amy

Reply
Elena Stokes
4/5/2016 07:01:54 am

That night we met after the Snyderman exhibit/talk and I said what it was I took away from it: to not just make masterfully executed work but to bring compelling ideas as well. You succeed brilliantly, Your work is exquisite, powerful, thoughtful and authentic. Brava.

Reply
Amy Meissner link
4/7/2016 06:41:21 am

Elena,
Thank you so much for sharing this with me. I think your work is already luminous and compelling. I loved meeting you and can't wait for our paths to cross again someday soon.
XO
Amy

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Nancy Dasenbrock
4/26/2016 09:01:52 pm

The round doily with the letter behind it... I have some of this style that I bought in Brittany 25 years ago ... Lace making is trying to make a comeback there, but I bought these from an elderly lady at the market in point aven. FYI

Reply
Amy Meissner link
4/27/2016 06:09:01 am

Hi Nancy,
Thank you so much for taking the time to share this information! So many of these items have traveled so far (before even reaching me) and it's wonderful to not only hear the inklings of origins, but that this traditional handwork is being held with intention elsewhere in the world as well.
Many thanks--
Amy

Reply



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    Amy Meissner, textile artist. Photo credit Brian Adams, 2013. www.amymeissner.com

    Amy Meissner

    Artist in Anchorage, Alaska, sometimes blogging about the collision of history, family & art, with the understanding that none exists without the other.

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