Richard Saja

I first saw Richard Saja's work at The Future Perfect in Brooklyn several years ago. Richard re-upholsters furniture in toile, and then further embellishes the pastoral scenes with not-so-pastoral touches in embroidery: setting fire to a woman's skirt, adding a clown nose to a nobleman. This work is one of my favorites. It's the marriage of King Arthur to Guinevere as superheroes re-worked over toile in glow-in-the-dark thread.

Richard and I became friends a few years back when he came to see my show at Art Star in 2006 and we since then have somehow managed to read one another's minds, like the time we both eerily did pillows of braille embroidered in french knots in the same month:


Link to Richard's pillow


Link to my pillow

Is it just me, or is it even stranger that his is black, mine is white and they're photographed in identical positions?


Link to Historically Innacurate

Link to Glow-in-the-Dark Thread

Diem Chau

Continuing with embroidery-meets-porcelain. I was introduced to Diem Chau's work through our mutual participation in the Devotion to Thread show curated by Faythe Levine. When I first saw images of Chau's work, I couldn't believe the amount of detail she'd integrated into the porcelain, but I found out that her works are actually comprised of barely-there silk that she's embroidered and cloaked over bowls, plates and cups. The images she stitches are extremely simple, but graceful and gentle.

Link