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The Artist that I want to talk about today is from Mexico, his name is Gabriel Dawe. For more than 10 years now, he has been consistently creating site-specific installations made up of rainbow coloured threads. Like many other artists, he started off as a humble graphic designer, and eventually, his career path took a turn and he slowly started generating works based on his passion in Fashion and Architecture. The thread used in his artwork represents the sewing machismo of his home country where men are frown upon if they perform tasks deemed to be feminine. His grandmother would often forbid him to pick up the sewing needle as a kid, thus in his later life, he decided to use Thread as his main medium, using this as an attempt to explore and subvert the social constructs of gender. Since the nature of his thread installation is complex in nature throughout all themes, he named them “Plexus” (noun, an intricate network).

To Gabriel Dawe, Fashion and Architecture share one thing in common: The Human need for shelter. The main function of clothes and buildings is to protect an individual and to provide sanctuary. Each installation is painstakingly put together, and many wonder what happens to these thread after installation is dismantled. Gabriel collects all the threads and sorts them according to their colour, and in continuation, proceed to create another piece of artwork which he calls “Relics”, which subsequently gives it a second lease of life in a compacted box. His artwork is at the crossroads of textile, art and perception – put together in a creative and dynamic way. His work brings about a sense of tenderness and serenity to its viewers and beyond just that, it encapsulates the artist’s growing pains and his gripes with societal issues.

Bibliography:

Adler, Maggie (2016). Embodied Light. Amon Carter Museum of American Art. p. 7.

Gabriel Dawe Visual Artist. (n.d.). Retrieved September 12, 2020, from https://www.gabrieldawe.com/

Shovava, Day, T., Comma, & Colorsheets, V. (2018, July 06). Interview: The Artist Who Stretches Delicate Strands of Thread to Produce Awe-Inspiring Rainbows Indoors. Retrieved September 12, 2020, from https://mymodernmet.com/gabriel-dawe-thread-art/

 

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