James Siena
Editions in handmade paper
Dieu Donné is pleased to feature two editions in handmade paper created by James Siena: Floppy Combs and When I Was Ten.
Produced in collaboration with artistic director Paul Wong, these works take Siena’s linear systems to another dimension. The artist’s use of cast handmade paper pushes Siena’s graphic work into new territory through its unpredictably physical and eccentric nuances.
Both editions feature imagery that the artist has explored earlier in his life and career. Floppy Combs, derived from a motif that first appeared in 1983, has been explored most recently in drawings and as a wood engraving. When I Was Ten dates back to a drawing creating during Siena’s childhood. Now lost, the drawing featured perpendicular, rounded, and continuous shapes. The young artist recalls saying to himself: “I’m going to do this again when I grow up.”
In order to bring these drawings to life in paper, Siena scribed his two images in clay slabs, from which a rubber mold was made. Black cotton pulp was cast into the molds by hand, and attached to a backing sheet of high-shrinkage fiber (white linen rag pulp for Floppy Combs and a persimmon colored abaca sheet for When I Was Ten). The pieces were dried slowly to enhance the shrinkage and buckling of the sheets as the two different fibers pulled against each other.
For pricing information about these editions, or to schedule an appointment to view the work in person, please contact Rebecca Lax at rlax@dieudonne.org or Kathleen Flynn at kflynn@dieudonne.org or call 212-226-0573.
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Top right: When I Was Ten, 2008, cast cotton on pigmented abaca base sheet, 19.5 x 15 x 0.25 inches. Bottom right: Floppy Combs, 2008, cast cotton on linen rag base sheet, 18 x 14.5 x 0.25 inches.
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