Prestville Art Site -- Gallery One: Textiles: Jackets

Gallery One: Textiles : Jackets

The jackets were begun in 1979 after a hitch-hiking trip across Canada. The impetous for the first peice was a sense of wonderment, communion and personal transformation. This, combined with a life-long disbelief in the politics of destruction, resulted in the West Coast Jacket (1980), a flexible peice of stained glass, kinetic sculpture that becomes a deeply expressive 'other skin'. The exclusive use of military jackets is essential. A fundamental aspect of the work is the promotion of demilitarization, the taking of something mass-produced, de-humanizing, with a function specific to destruction, and through the contemplative and prolonged interaction with it, by the action of creating, reinvigorate it with a celebration of life which permanently removes it from it's previous function.

Dripping, Beaded Military Jacket, 1984-87

Night Sky, Embroidered Military Jacket, 2001

West Coast, Beaded Military Jacket, 1980

Grateful, Embroidered Military Jacket, 1981-88

Flowersun, Beaded Military Jacket, 1988-2004

Moonflow, Beaded Military Jacket, 2003

Forest Canopy, Beaded Military Jacket, 1988/2003-04

Write: richardpreston@prestvilleartsite.com

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