Jennie Johnston’s Artist Statement:
Creating in tandem with Jen has allowed a flow and spontaneity to enter my practice. As our collaboration progressed and our friendship grew over many months of messages, Facetime conversations, and social media interactions, our initial fabric exchange shifted focus to our shared passion of books and poetry. A key to the success of this project was allowing each person space to change our minds, to look for inspiration gently and putting little to no pressure on outcomes.
Our initial fabric exchange led to my improvisational quilt Poet’s Thread.
As our poem exchange began, each of us found themes: home, rivers, threads, that spoke to the direction of our fabric books. Expanding from the words on the page, to selecting one line from each of the 12 poems to add to my book, the lines took on more power becoming a new poem. Flowing from this process another quilt was born with panels corresponding to each book page.The idea of being held by these words, the fabric itself and the sound of the words expanded the idea to include a sound piece.
Each of us found our process adapting to meet that of the other, mine becoming more intuitive and Jen’s becoming more planned, this was an unexpected but important outcome. The trust and openness that is required of a process like this seemed to coalesce for us over the last two years. It has been a privilege to bring forth this work together.
