"Garden of the Mind No. 1", Hand-Dyed and Embroidered Silk Organza.
Mary Beth Yates
Finding Home
11 a.m.-5 p.m.
Leedy-Voulkos Art Center
2012 Baltimore
Kansas City, MO
816.474.1919
Hours: 11 a.m.-5 p.m., Wednesday-Saturday
Runs through: July 25.
Artist’s site: http://www.marybethyates.com
Gallery site: http://www.leedy-voulkos.com
The phrase “moving back home” has an unfortunate connotation of regression, conjuring up images of unrealized dreams and a pullout couch in the parents’ basement.
As often as not, though, returning to one’s native city or state is a progressive step. It certainly has been for Mary Beth Yates, who returned to New Mexico last year after attending, graduating from and teaching at the Kansas City Art Institute.
Yates’ new work, now on display at the Leedy-Voulkos Art Center, continues a tradition of intricate, delicate construction … but extends much farther into the third dimension than her earlier fabric constructions.
The 800 thread-wrapped wires of Growth Spurt, gathered into nine separate clusters, all but burst from the wall — and the wooden spouts which hold them — under some unseen pressure. The other two pieces, hand-died and embroiderd silk works titled on the theme Garden of the Mind, are softer and gentler in their implied movements but no less irresistible.
For those, Yates writes, I use heavily embroidered surfaces to create dimensional landscapes. By using multiple thread colors, several layers of stitching and directional changes in embroidery, I create slowly moving, rotating, creeping surfaces that move along the wall in various directions. Reminiscent of moss, roots and other similar natural occurrences, this type of growth is slow and deliberate with the ultimate result of looking random and unintentional.
The wires, Yates goes on, continue the theme of growth and movement.Through their variations in color and the shape and texture of their individual linear elements, growth and movement are more sudden and spontaneous, like a burst of flame or a sudden wind.
That said, Yates’ “placid” works have dynamic aspects, too. Garden of the Mind No. 1, the piece pictured above, could be a cross-section of cells, seen through a microscope. The deep flame-colored parts of each panel look like neurons, firing information from one segment to the next. The garden, then, becomes one in which seeds can be planted and come to fruition within a span of seconds or minutes, rather than weeks or months.
Yates’ years in Kansas City helped her grow as an artist. Clearly, the move back to New Mexico has done the same — and sped that growth along. Whatever is in the soil of her home state, it’s fertile ground for Yates’ creativity … and this summer, viewers here can enjoy the fruits of her mental garden.
1 Comment
June 18, 2009 at 11:32 pm
Quite an evolution (makes sense, of course and is lovely to see) from the more-2D dyed and embroidered silk “paintings” she was working on when I got to write about her for The Northeast News … 2000 or ‘01 or ‘02. I remember that New Mexico was important. (Make no mistake, I loved those flatter works, too : )