Abstract
dc:description.abstractEngaging with both the materiality and visuality of the embroidered artworks by Marguerite Zorach and Elaine Reichek, this thesis analyzes the material acknowledgement, or lack thereof, of the embroidery medium in both the artists' own motivations and how the Museum of Modern Art represents and displays modern embroideries. Often perceived as old-fashioned, in both cultural and artistic frameworks there is at a times tremulous acceptance of the embroidery medium. Both Zorach and Reichek's embroideries are undoubtedly rooted in modernist ideas surrounding form, subject, and aesthetics. Expressed in thread, the concepts behind these artworks are closely stitched to the medium itself, enhanced by the textural and methodological process of embroidery. Despite this, the modes of display used by the MoMA exhibits portray a reluctance to fully embrace and acknowledge the importance of materiality in in the history of embroidery. Examining the inclusion of Zorach's The Circus in the 1938 Three Centuries of American Art exhibition alongside Reichek's 1999 solo exhibition Projects 67: Elaine Reichek displaying her When This You See… embroidery series, this thesis evaluates each artist's use of the medium and how the respective exhibitions framed the embroidered artworks.
Degree
thesis:*- Name thesis:degree_name
- Master of Arts
- Level thesis:degree_level
- masters
- Discipline thesis:degree_discipline
- Material Culture and Public Humanities
- Department dc:contributor.department
- Material Culture and Public Humanities
- Grantor dc:publisher
- Virginia Tech
- Year dc:date.issued
- 2024
Author and committee
dc:creator, dc:contributor.*- Author dc:creator
-
- Atallah, Grace Elizabeth
- Chair dc:contributor.committeechair
-
- Ronan, Anne Elizabeth
- Committee members dc:contributor.committeemember
-
- Moseley Christian, Michelle Yvonne
- Smith-Glaviana, Dina C.
Subjects
dc:subject × 7Rights
dc:rights- Statement dc:rights
-
- In Copyright
- Licence dc:rights.uri
- Language dc:language.iso
- en
Identifiers
dc:identifier.*- Dc Identifier Other
- vt_gsexam:40354
- OAI identifier oai:identifier
- oai:vtechworks.lib.vt.edu:10919/119015