Polytopia; post manufacturing industry textiles including canvass, upholstery, vinyl, nylon, foiled nylon wall covering, ripstop and waterproof fabrics, thread, staples; pyramid components 6 x 6 inches at the base x 7 inches tall, above installation at upART 2011 overall size 9 x 12 feet wide; 2011.
Polytopia is a sewn textile exploration of form inspired by geometry, evolution, and utopian states.
Foiled wallpaper is combined with orange safety nylon and fuschia luggage textile.
The fabrics are mostly deadstock, mill end rolls, and the excess of various industries manufacturing luggage, cars, airplanes, household goods and interiors. Many of the textiles are various upholstery types, like lederette vinyl, and nylon like the kind made into knapsacks. The silver and gold are foiled nylon wallpaper.
The patterns were originally hand drafted; currently they are digitally manipulated and printed.
All the pyramids were hand cut and machine sewn, and then to each other they are affixed, in the current iteration, with some 8000 staples.
There is a lot of guessing as to the nature of the textiles and how they might handle being cut, sewn and ironed, since some were never even meant to be held together by thread. Usually the same materials are never available again, and so the design evolves by using similar fabrics, for example white for silver, or one dark purple for another dark purple of a different texture.
Working with such constraints induces an evolution of the piece beyond the influence of pure aesthetic preferences.
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