Maris Van Vlack

Using traditional textile techniques, Maris Van Vlack constructs tactile images that reference topography, geology, and generational memory. The Rhode Island School of Design graduate’s work is primarily hand-woven, consisting of panels of fabric slowly built up thread by thread, trapping memory and history in the sedimentary process. After hand-weaving the base tapestry, she layers the surface with drawn, painted, and stitched marks and incorporates areas of industrial jacquard weaving and stoll knitting. Each piece balances the materiality of the fibers and the atmosphere created within the deep pictorial space. The landscapes in the work depict architectural spaces from her family’s history, referencing photographs of places in Europe destroyed during World War II, where family members lived. Her work is a window through which to see layers of time and memory, depicting the space between the past and the present. Her work has been the subject of solo exhibitions at Bromfield Gallery (Boston, USA) and Gallery 263 (Cambridge, USA), as well as in group presentations at the Icelandic Textile Center (Blönduós, Iceland), the The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts (Washington, D.C.), and the RISD Museum (Providence, USA).