Exhibition Information

Libby Kowalski: A Retrospective in Fibers
January 25-February 19, 2016

This exhibition features work by Libby Kowalski, former Art and Art History Department faculty member at SUNY Cortland and founder of KOVA Textiles.  The span of her career is organized into three sections in the show:  double cloth weavings from 1979-1994, mixed media textiles from 1997-2004, and her recent 2015-2016 series made from high-tech materials.

The articulation of opposites is an important conceptual aspect of her earliest works, the double cloth weavings. Delicate cotton and linen yarns are woven into bold, geometrical imagery in these pieces, which reflect the historical influence of Russian Constructivism and the then contemporary aesthetic of the first computer motherboards and the Apple Macintosh 128K.  

At the turn of the millennium, textured cloths and heavy laces were popularized by the garment district in New York City.  Inspired by the 17th-century Baroque palaces and churches Kowalski had recently visited in France, she sprayed such fabrics with gesso and gilded and painted them in several layers.  The sumptuous, painted planes of sculptural relief contrast starkly with the sparse visual spaces of her earlier weavings.

In 2004, Kowalski founded KOVA Textiles in New York City, for which she designs window shade fabrics from high-tech materials.  Her current body of work focuses on the repurposing of flawed or damaged KOVA fabrics. The physical properties of these sophisticated yarns make them unique as art materials. Their hollow core inspired experimentation with capillary action, and the resulting pieces look like ancient ikat weavings with a distinctly contemporary slant. The flexible but firm quality of the materials also inspired sculptural forms that are completely untethered from the wall, allowing the artist to venture for the first time into the realm of the fully three-dimensional with her work.

Kowalski taught in the Art and Art History Department at SUNY Cortland from 1982-2001. She currently works at KOVA Textiles and resides in Brooklyn.

To register, call 607.753.4216 or email erika.fowler-decatur@cortland.edu. Location: Fibers Studio, 1st Floor, Dowd Fine Arts Center

Image:  Libby Kowalski, Untitled (detail), 2015, vinyl coated polyester and polymer alloy yarns and ink.

VIDEO: Artist's Talk, Feb 3, Part 1

VIDEO: Artist's Talk, Feb 3, Part 2