Wrong side, Daily Thread: Piece No. 1, in progress
ARTIST STATEMENT
I’ve worked in several media as an artist – drawings, collages, paintings – but in recent years I’ve focused on embroidery. I create abstract, improvisational works using pearl cotton on linen. Abstract embroidery appeals to me because it combines the linearity of drawing with the color and texture of painting. I love the feel of linen and the process of working stitches by hand with needle and thread. Everything about it feels right.
I’ve recently completed two yearlong daily projects (stitch journals) for which I stitched each day on linen with a color observed in nature in my backyard. A Year in Thread (2016) consists of 12 pieces that I began on the first day of each month and finished on the last. The 18 pieces of Daily Thread (2019) were worked on for varying lengths of time. Each Daily Thread piece had a particular theme, such as “winged,” “bark and bramble,” “sky,” or “verdant.” Daily Thread was exhibited in June 2022 at the Hosmer Gallery in Northampton’s Forbes Library. In September 2022, I exhibited both A Year in Thread and Daily Thread together at Easthampton City Arts (ECA) Gallery.
I’m also engaged in creating abstract watercolors on the theme of “stones and water” as part of the "100 days of creative acts" project organized by author Suleika Jaouad and the Isolation Journals. These watercolors were exhibited at the Hosmer Gallery in Northampton’s Forbes Library in June 2022 and in a September 2022 solo show at Easthampton City Arts (ECA) Gallery.
I’m available to teach classes or workshops on drawing, embroidery stitches and techniques, meditative embroidery/slow stitching, and developing a personal stitching practice.
To inquire about purchasing work, please click the email icon below or visit my Etsy shop.
BIO
Bonnie Sennott is an artist and knitwear designer based in Amherst, Massachusetts. She has shown her work in solo and group exhibitions at Kingston Gallery and the Copley Society in Boston, Northampton’s Center for the Arts, the Easthampton Center for the Arts Gallery, the Wistariahurst Museum in Holyoke, Vermont’s Brattleboro Museum and Art Center, and other venues. A former member of Kingston Gallery, she holds an MFA from the University of Chicago. Her work is in private collections in New York, Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, and elsewhere.
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Blue Peninsula: Knitwear Designs by Bonnie Sennott