Aran Series

2016

Each canvas of the Aran series is layered with motifs and patterns within patterns—just like what you would see in these famous Irish knitted sweaters. I wanted to create a visual exploration of that process. But it’s not just any pattern or sweater. Arans are the most important to me, though it took a great shock to see why.

Sometimes you’re simply too close to a subject to see connections, as funny as that may sound. My mother never went a day without knitting her Aran sweaters, made also of unbleached material (wool, in her case). But it wasn’t until her last sweater (baby-sized for the next yet-unborn family member) that I took home after cleaning out her apartment, did I realize the connection between our shared complex patterns: hers in her Arans, mine in my repetitive reliefs.

To this day, I can hear—and now see, in my work— the click-click, click-clicking away of Betty with her knitting needles, knitting her traditional Aran sweaters.