Artist's Statement All cultures create and use cloth. It serves purely functional purposes that make our liveseasier and richer. It satisfies our aesthetic and sensory needs by providing beauty and comfort when we make it, touch it, see it, and use it. It can hide and disguise us or expose and call attention to us. It can be a source of identification and communication. It is mysterious and awe inspiring and at the same time familiar and attainable. It can separate us from others or bring individuals or groups together. In these ways it becomes our environment and satisfies our physical, emotional and spiritual needs. In the most basic sense, I want to make cloth that serves all of those needs. I want to create an environment not in the universal sense, but in terms of an individual scale; work that is appreciated as an art form, but embraces, rather than alienates.
I am interested in the physical structure of cloth and experiment with the characteristics and interactions of various types of fibers and finishing treatments. I also introduce color and texture to create visual depth and layering. My primary interest has been in constructing cloth that finds it's own form and shape in the finishing process after is it released from the strict, flat, repetitive grid system of the loom. In planning the structure of the cloth, I try to predict and direct its final form and still allow it to find its own voice. Weaving is a way of telling a story in cloth, one thread at a time. One of the reasons I chose cloth as my medium is because it has a life of its own that can't be totally controlled. I outline my story by choosing a structure within the limits of the woven grid. I describe my characters by choosing yarns and colors. I steer the plot with structure and fiber types. Despite all my planning and direction, the cloth changes shape when it comes off the loom, when it is washed or after-treated, and yet again when it is used or displayed. Needle-felting gives me a chance to break away from the grid that is inherent in weaving and it's also more flexible and portable. Both the weaving and the needle-felting are narrative processes for me. Other media seem static to me. Paint dries and brush marks are permanent. The fired pot never changes shape. With fiber, the color goes all the way through and is mixed in the yarns and again in the cloth. Cloth is anything but static, both in the making and in how it is exhibited or used. By following a thread I hope to connect the cloth to people and cultures. The final cloth tells the story.
BIO
Briony Jean Foy designs and creates one-of-a-kind woven and felted pieces in her studio in Madison, WI. She teaches weaving and other textile design courses at the University of Wisconsin- Madison and Milwaukee campuses and also gives workshops and private lessons across the country and in Canada. She has exhibited nationally and internationally and is the recipient of a Wisconsin Arts Board Fellowship Award in recognition of her work in the visual arts.