Feature Articles
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September Issue 2004

The City Gallery in North Charleston, SC, Features Works by Susan Sorrell

The City Gallery at the North Charleston Performing Arts/Convention Center Complex in North Charleston, SC, will present the exhibition, Hanging On By A Thread, featuring a fiber retrospective by Susan Sorell from Sept. 2 - 29, 2004.

Sorrell should place a warning on her site -Beware, heavily embellished decorative work ahead - as her work is bright, colorful, creative, fun and over embellished. For Sorrell it is not the clean paired back message of Modernism or even the hodgepodge of overly pretentious imagery that we now see as Post-Modernism.

Sorrell creates textile collages but there is no paired back aesthetic here, as she breaks the rules producing richly textured surfaces that incorporate beading, painting, printmaking, photography, computer images and found objects in what can only be describe as full throttle, over embellished, and richly decorated style.

This heavy handed over embellishment will not appeal to everyone, but it is a breath of fresh air, which is far from empty headed or simply eye candy. For a long time artists that used pattern applied techniques with such a heavy decorative hand were tolerated or worse still simply ignored, until Miriam Schapiro's Decoration Movement in the 70s and 80s. You can see the influence of this movement and other artists such as Susan Shie, Faith Ringgold and Joyce Scott are two other artistic influences.

Sorrell's work brushes up against the edges of many boundaries set in established art practice. There is no "less is more" philosophy in play here. This results in questioning good and bad taste, high and low art while also taking textiles as a medium out of the domestic sphere and all its associated practicality, into the realm of art. When set in this context you can see that Sorrell's highly textured work is not mere eye candy alone.

Sorrell trained at Winthrop University in Rock Hill, SC and Converse College in Spartanburg, SC. She has worked as a graphic designer, art instructor, and artist. Sorrell has also won numerous awards and has shown her work all over the United States.

Sorrell will be offering a "meet the artist/demo" on Sept., 25, 2004, from 1-5pm at the gallery.

For more information check our SC Institutional Gallery listings, or call Olga Bixby at the Gallery 843/308-4709 or 843/745-1087. Or e-mail Sorell at (sorrell@creativechick.com) or at (www.creativechick.com).


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