BETWEEN NEEDLE AND LENS: THE ART OF MELISSA ZEXTER

| by Barbara Pavan |

Melissa Zexter hand-embroideres photographs that she has taken herself. Her work combines a modern, mechanically reproducible medium with a traditional handcraft practice. Her research explores the three-dimensional dimension of photography while investigating themes such as memory and identity. Through the act of embroidery, Zexter transforms each photograph into a unique object that can no longer be reproduced, in contrast to the overwhelming proliferation of images in the contemporary era.

Born in Rhode Island, Zexter lives in Brooklyn, New York. She received a BFA in Photography from the Rhode Island School of Design and an MFA from New York University.

She has exhibited internationally in both private galleries and institutional venues, including Gagné Contemporary, Toronto, Canada; The Camp Gallery, Miami, FL; Muriel Guépin Gallery New York; the Triennale Milano, the Fuller Craft Museum, Robert Mann Gallery, and the Bronx Museum of the Arts. Her work has been published and reviewed in numerous publications, including Needlexchange Podcast,  Afterimage, ELEPHANT, Juxtapoz, The New York Times, The Boston Herald, The New Yorker, Art New England, BUST, and New York Magazine.

Photography and embroidery: how do you combine two so different techniques in your artistic practice?

Photography has always been a central part of my life for as long as I can remember. I was 8 when I got my first camera. Growing up I was always the keeper of the family photo albums, have very early memories of family slide shows, and I always carried a camera around to photograph friends and family. In college, I studied photography at the Rhode Island School of Design (USA) and I received a masters degree in photography from New York University/ International Center of Photography.  I have never stopped taking pictures and challenging myself by inventing new ways to present photographs.

I often take pictures without a plan on how I will transform them with the addition of sewing. My first goal is to make a strong photo that can stand alone without the thread. Once I print my photos, I visualize an image or pattern that could work with the specific picture.  The imagined sewing pattern always grows and changes once I get started and often takes me much longer than I had planned. Over time, my imagery has evolved from anonymous figures to landscapes to portraits.  My sewing has evolved from stitching of abstract reproductions of personal souvenirs such as a bus map of my Brooklyn neighborhood, to a floral pattern from a dress I wore as a child, and a plan of a Russian city center where my grandfather lived.  I also like to sew from the back of the photograph as the result is much more textured and less controlled, which I really like. I have been combining working from the reverse and from the front simultaneously. Sewing from the reverse creates a much more three-dimensional look. The thread has a life of its own.

How did the thread come into your art?

I have been combining the two mediums of photography and thread for over 20 years.

As I expanded the possibilities of photography, I incorporated a variety of mixed media techniques with photography. During an artist residency in upstate New York, (in 1999), I began making paper and sewing figurative narratives directly into the paper. The natural progression led me to embroider onto my photographs that featured images of figures. I always loved hands on techniques in addition to the immediacy of photography. As I created these early works,  hand sewing allowed me to draw with a needle and thread, to create curved lines and to create an intimacy between the object, the viewer, and myself.

Observing your works, I noticed that the feminine – in all its forms – is one of the most recurring themes. It’s correct?

The subjects of many of my embroidered photographs are of women and girls. There are a lot of women in my life.  I choose to photograph them for my works.  I relate more to women’s experiences and a female sensibility. I also photograph many other subjects including landscapes, cityscapes, and details from everyday life. I  also invite people to be photographed if I feel that their face or demeanour will engage meaningfully with my embroidery.  Sometimes I take pictures without a plan on how I will transform them with the addition of sewing. My first goal is to make a strong photo that can stand alone without the thread (whether it’s a portrait of a male or a female). Once I print my photos, I visualize an image or pattern that could work with the specific picture.  The imagined sewing pattern always grows and changes once I get started . The challenge is always in working towards the unknown.

How are your work born? Is the embroidery intervention inspired by the content or does it follow the formal lines of the photo? And does it have a conceptual value or is it a technical choice in order to give greater three-dimensionality to the image only?

Once satisfied with the original photograph, I commence to personalizing it with embroidery.  The  addition of thread acts as a tool of physical connection to the photograph, bringing the sitter to life, and hand embroidery offers me the opportunity to alter time. My sewing decisions from pattern to color of thread are instinctual reactions to the image. For instance, many of my patterns that I embroidered for the “Maps and Memories” series are abstract reproductions of personal souvenirs (maps, dress pattern, etc).

I typically study the photograph and visualizes a color that matches the mood of the subject. Sometimes specific colors stir a memory reminding me of a person or it may be a color that reflects my mood at the time. Many of my more recent works such as Girl by a Radiator, Veil,  and Fox Fur employ looser, abstract stitching which encourages further reflection upon the combination of the two mediums. Of late, I find myself being more interested in making three-dimensional art. When I layer the sewing or use a looser sewing method it often adds a more multi layered effect to the photograph.  I have always been someone who sees in detail. So theembroidery was a logical step for me in my art making process.

How has your work and research evolved and how has it changed over time?

Inititially, I created photographs of figures whose identity couldn’t be recognized. I sometimes photographed them intentially out of focus or veiled. I also painted onto some of the pictures with very detailed colorful patterns overlayed by embroidery.  In my later series, I omitted the paint and focused on creating color and texture solely through the use of thread, layering colors and a variety of sewing techniques.  I have also altered my photographs by removing part of the emulsion and sewing into the altered photograph.  Now, I like to be specific with my portraits, nothing is veiled any more. The identity of the sitter is revealed.

Is there also this idea of ‘memory’ in your practice and in your artistic research?

Because of the materials I use and some of the imagery that I incorporate there are references to the past, present, and future.  I am very interested in the relationship between photography and memory. The embroidery on my photography is a way to add an intimacy of touch to the photographs. I am also interested in the combination of heart/ mind/ machine/hand – a machine (the camera) records the image- it is made permanent, but it is the hand and the thread that transforms the photograph.  The addition of embroidery brings the photograph that was taken in the past back into the present.

I am also interested in extending the time it takes to make a photograph—a swift process that involves taking a picture and printing it- into a lengthy and challenging act.   Hand sewing alters time and allows me to react to a moment – the photograph- and alter and adjust the memory.

Photographs are definitely a catalyst for rememberance. I believe that photography and embroidery have – in a different way – a common link to the concept of ‘memory’: the first delivers the present moment to the future, the second draws on practices of the past. Photographs can enable a visual recall of a past event, person or place through their representation of what/ who is captured within the image. Photographs have an impact on our conception of remembrance.

Who are the people who most inspired or influenced your art?

I love analog photography and the many photographers that I discovered early on in my photographic education are still some of my favorites. 

I have many sources of inspiration. Maps, Indian miniature paintings, the ocean, antique samplers, 19^th century American silhouettes, family snapshots, puzzles, vintage fabric design, Art Deco design, Diane Arbus,  E.J. Belocq, Brassai,  Lisette Model, Florine Stettenheimer, Man Ray, and so many more.

Also, I grew up in a historical house in Rhode Isltand hat was built in 1698. My parents were antiques dealers and our house served as a warehouse for paintings, furniture, embroideries, rugs, etc. I see this as being a indirect influence to my appreciation of the handmade, the historic and all that is beautiful.

What is (and why) the work (or series of works) that you consider your masterpiece, the one that best represents you?

I do like my earliest series of embroidered portraits which I call Maps and Memories as they reflect on a time when I discovered materials that I really loved to work with.  I hadn’t really sewn much before, so it was exciting to experiment with altering my images with thread and to create a

physical braille for the fingers by way of the tactile surface. Many of the techniques that I had experimented with earlier on sort of came to work together (painting, photography, mosaic making, knitting, etc.)

I don’t really have a masterpiece or just one image that represents me. I have been using this technique for more than two decades now andI relate the photographs to different years of my life. The portraits of my friends, family, or strangers do take me back to times that represented where I was.  For a very long time I have been enamoured with how photographs can subtly be altered. I enjoy personalising an otherwise ambiguous photograph, with sewn details of personal significance.

One of my favorite pieces is my photograph of a woman with a cardinal. It reminds me of my father. I wished I hadn’t sold it, so I made another one with a blue bird but it didn’t have the same meaning to me.

In your opinion, what is the meaning and sense of ‘making art’ today and what role does art and the artist play in contemporary society?

Making art for me is a way to map my existance and get through each day. I love the meditative process of sewing. For me, making art can be a way to discover the unknown. My art is meaningful to myself and serves as a way to reeavulate current personal situations as well as my relationshop to the photographic object itself.  The art really only has true meaning to myself. Perhaps it has some meaning to others, but I don’t really worry about that when I’m making things.