interview with jean alexander frater...warp and weft magazine

interview with gallery artist jean alexander frater featured in warp and weft magazine

1. How did you discover weaving and was what your greatest resource as a beginner?

My painting practice has always had an aspect of structuralism; I deconstruct the materials of a painting as well as the lexicon of Painting, as a way to engage in building up meaning through form and language.

About 20 years ago, I began painting directly on un-stretched raw canvas. I think this directness with the canvas, though still acting as the support to the paint, made me approach everything differently.  The canvasses’ inherent materiality could not be ignored.  I began experimenting in different ways of how one makes a painting.  I wanted to highlight the support, and prioritizing the cotton fabric became my focus.  I started folding and manipulating the canvas in various ways. This experimentation resulted in an excess of painted canvas.  Both out of frustration, and out of limited resources,  I started tearing up my paintings.  Weaving the colorful strips was the next move.  I liked the idea that the paintings held gestures of both destruction and care.

2. How do you define your practice – do you consider yourself an artist / craftsperson / weaver / designer / general creative or a combination of those? Is this definition important to you?

I consider myself a Painter.

This designation places the objects I make (Paintings) in a specific art historical tradition which hosts many imbedded hierarchies including: chosen material, gestures privileged, subject matter depicted, angular or rectilinear picture plane, etc,.  I like subverting these hierarchies by using different traditions, forms, gestures.  While sometimes the approach can be considered irreverent, I think it is also very open and expansive.  The techniques of weaving, for example, have opened up my painting practice into new territories which I find exciting and full of possibilities. 

3. Describe your first experience with weaving.

My first experience with weaving happened very naturally in the studio, noticing, handling and responding to canvas.  I thought about the edges of each strip of torn canvas as a way to draw.  

Perhaps like many weavers  who dye or color their weaving materials; I begin by making a huge colorfield painting on a large canvas stapled to my studio wall.  I paint the canvas in layers of paint, anticipating it’s inevitable destruction.  Once I am satisfied with the extra large painting, I tear it into strips of canvas and then build the painting on to a (scaled down) wooden stretcher, using the torn strips of painted canvas. 

A typical Painting is made by applying paint in layers, covering and exposing surface area with pigment, gesture and brushstroke.  In my work, the finished painting is torn up, re-worked, re-shaped, and built again; using weaving techniques as a way to draw, and re-articulate the rhetoric of Painting.

4. What is your creative process, from the initial idea to the finished piece? Are there specific weave structures, looms, or fibers that are important to your process?

Most of my medium and larger scale paintings are planned out. I consider form, scale,  and color choices; including under-painted colors.  I leave moments open for slight variations. I try to keep the idea very clear and not introduce too many ideas into one piece; so it’s helpful to draw, quite a bit. 

I use drawing, to move through ideas quickly, often going through stacks of paper and spending 10 seconds on each sketch and then throwing it on to the ground to collect and regard later.  I do this when I feel overwhelmed with ideas, and then I put the drawings into a folder and go through them later; keeping only the ones that I find compelling.  I build larger work from selected smaller drawings.

I also make smaller scale work.  These are made from unused pieces of larger work.  I don’t throw any of the painted canvas away, so I make smaller pieces when I have an idea, but need to work with the material to discover it’s form. 

 5. Does your work have a conceptual purpose or greater meaning? If so, do you center your making around these concepts?

I hope that the Painting’s existence starts to beg questions about it’s own making. I think the way I make a painting opens up all kinds of possibilities and conversations.

For example, when you start to ask how this thing was made you can start talking about destruction, care, rebuilding, scaling down, color relationships, form, bodies, framing, painting, weaving, gender, history and labor.

 

6. What is your favorite part of the weaving process and why? What’s your least favorite?

My favorite part is when I have been thinking about a particular painting that I want to see in the world but cannot figure out how to get there, and then it comes to me.

My second favorite part is when I carry out that idea and see it in real life, and see what happened.   Did it come close to what I was imagining? Did it become something else and was that something else the discovery or beginning of a new idea?

The process of  weaving is about hiding and revealing for me, and it does that all the time.  It’s probably why I love it! 

7. Do you sell your work or make a living from weaving? If so, what does that look like and how has that affected your studio practice?

Yes.  I make my living by selling my work.  I love it when a piece leaves the studio.  I feel unburdened.  I feel like that thing can go and be. I have also been fortunate to work with some amazing artists and designers who introduce new ideas and push me to explore paths that I may have otherwise abandoned.  I feel like making Paintings is the thing I am good at – so I want to spend time doing it.

8. Where do you find inspiration?

Everywhere.

9. What other creatives do you admire – weavers, artists, entrepreneurs – and why?

I have a small storefront where I host solo exhibitions, called Material.

I admire each one of the artists and curators who have made work for their exhibitions here. I love the varied practices and also the seriousness they collectively bring to their work.  They continue to inspire me endlessly: Nneka Kai, Adia Sykes, Julia Klein, Teresa Silva, Benjamin LaRose, Karen Dana, Ionit Behar, Rana Siegel, Nancy Wisti_Grayson, Michael Lopez, Lauren Leving, Stacia Yeapanis, Shonna Pryor, Shannon Favia, Tegan Brozyna Roberts, Mat Rappaport and Michael Workman,

10. If you could no longer weave/paint, what would you do instead?

I don’t know.  Maybe I would do the same thing and call it by a different name? ;)

Do you have any upcoming exhibits, talks, or events the community should know about?

The Peninsula, Chicago IL — June 15 - September 15, 2023

all available paintings by jean alexander frater can be view on our website with sizing and pricing. please call the gallery if you have any questions.