Pacita Abad - The images presented are taken from the new publication
Pacita Abad, the first ever, superbly designed retrospective dedicated to
This exuberant and internationally itinerant Filipino artist, who created
"trapunto" works of art combining painting with embroidery and other
aspects of artistic creation based on fibers. "Textiles, for Abad,
were more than a material consideration," writes Victoria Sung, curator
of the Walker exhibition. "They constituted a theoretical modality - which
integrated feminist, transnational and decolonial strategies - in
the insistence of their creator on considering the fabric as a painting, the
sewing as a job and ornamentation as a goal. Just like the
Congolese sappers (and today's sapeuses, as they are called)
mixed and matched different items of European clothing to
Creating bold and elegant ensembles, Abad has created his own aesthetic of
composition using the trapunto technique (from the Italian word trapungere
meaning "to embroider"). Abad describes trapunto in simple terms: I paint with
oil or acrylic on a canvas, then I make a collage. This layer
upper part carries the drawing. I add a backdrop and padding in
polyester between the two. The two layers are then assembled using
stitches. Yet the medium is far from simple. Abad practiced
a provocative form of bricolage that art historian Patrick Flores has
described, without laughing, as the work of a "flaneur bricoleur".
