Warren Seelig

Constructed Surface: A Metaphorical Textile

Course Description
This highly experimental course will examine the possibilities of constructing a three-dimensional surface through either known or invented processes. We will think of the “textile” as a metaphor in developing this problem, understanding that woven cloth is a pliable, organic plane where each and every thread contributes to the visual, tactile and overall material quality of the whole. Participants will choose their own materials and develop methods of fabrication which allow connection and attachment of materials; then we will consider constructing surface through processes involving accumulation, repetition, wrapping, binding, alteration, twisting, piercing, and layering. During the workshop, “ material sketches” will evolve from each student and will be discussed in terms of their potential for compositional form on the wall, suspended in space, or off the floor, and the construction of surface will be discussed as an important initiator of form and idea. This course will be augmented with slide lectures over the week showing the work of fiber and material artists from the United States, Europe, and Asia whose work relates to the idea of constructed surface. Group discussion about our progress will occur throughout the week as well as a final critique at the end.

Skill Level
All levels. This course does not require prior knowledge of Fiber or Textile techniques.

Artist's Biography
Warren Seelig lives and works in Rockland, Maine. He holds the rank of distinguished visiting professor in the Craft/Fibers program at the University of the Arts in Philadelphia where he teaches, curates and writes on various subjects related to textile and fiber. He received a B.S. from the Philadelphia College of Textiles & Science and an M.F.A. from Cranbrook Academy of Art. He has twice received individual fellowships from the National Endowment for the arts and three fellowships from the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts. His work has been included in over 30 major museum exhibitions in the United states, Europe, Japan and Korea with many solo and group exhibitions in museums, universities, colleges and in private galleries. Seelig has lectured extensively including programs at the Korean National University of the Arts, Seoul, the Royal College of Art, London, Gerritt Rietveld Academy in Amsterdam and has written extensively for American Craft, Fiber Arts, Surface Design Journal, Textilforum, and Nouvel Objet.

Warren has been awarded a number of major corporate and public arts commissions throughout the United states and abroad and his work is in the collections of major museums, colleges, universities and in many private collections world wide. Seelig served on the executive board of the Haystack Mountain School of Crafts (Deer Isle, Maine), is currently on the board of the American Craft Council (New York). He participates as a mentor in the graduate program at the Maine College of Art (Portland, Maine) and is a visiting critic in the Textile program at the Rhode Island School of Design. Three years ago he was elected as a Fellow of the American Craft Council.

Artist's Statement
My recent work with Shadowfields has allowed me to construct a ‘textile’ which is metaphorical and less literal. Although born out of a corporeal sensibility involving a deep, fundamental attraction to materials and structural processes as a means of transforming, these material fields are becoming less tangible and more illusive. The complex relationship between materiality, light,and shadow is evolving into an energy field, a beautiful matrix of obsessively repeating parts and particles, expanding, swelling, increasing, and decreasing. For me, the textile is a phenomenon which is ‘spirited’ and evokes images of connection and connectedness, of crystalline fields, cellular atmospheres, and granular surface in three dimensions.