Reveling in the interplay of light, material, and space, Lillian Blades creates expansive and immersive installations that reflect on how we experience pattern and texture. Through the Veil, now on view at Sarasota Art Museum, marks the artist’s first institutional solo exhibition, bringing together a sweeping array of the Atlanta-based artist’s large-scale works.
Blades takes a multimedia approach to tapestry, combining fabric, stained glass, wood, acrylic, and found materials to create glimmering surfaces. She suspends some pieces from the ceiling, meandering through the gallery space like mixed-media curtains, while other assemblages hang on the wall. Colored light bounces onto the floor, and the loose latticework casts dramatic shadows onto the surrounding walls.
“My patchwork veils are wired tapestries of images and texture…I want it to feel complex but simple at the same time,” Blades says. “I want the details and the objects to carry memory and trigger viewers into thinking about their associations with certain patterns and textures.”
Through the Veil continues in Sarasota through October 26. Find more on the artist’s website and Instagram.
