BRANDON – Threads—we are all touched by threads every day. We wear them, sleep on them, and are warmed, cooled, and sheltered by them. And yet, for artists who use threads, fabric, and fiber as their medium, the word has another meaning.
For two local artists featured in the latest exhibition at the Brandon Artists Guild (BAG), literal threads are their paint, clay, stone, metal, and canvas—though they look to carry those threads forward in unique ways. The beauty of the common and the uncommon will be on display in their work from September 9 through November 6.
“Common Thread” is a new fabric and fiber arts exhibit by Althea Bilodeau Lamb and Judith Reilly. Although the two had a similar introduction to “threads,” their journey with them has led to entirely different worlds.
Raised on a farm and sewing almost since birth, Judith Reilly has spent her lifetime wrapped in thread. A “life-taught” artist, she has explored every avenue of the fabric/fiber media to arrive at her present whimsical style. Though her bucolic background is the foundation of her love of agricultural and barn-structure themes, the catawampus nature of her designs shows she is not bound by reality—a conceit that she finds intriguing and liberating, as she “simply cannot make a mistake.”
As a third-generation fiber artist, Althea Bilodeau Lamb expresses her love of fashion and color through textile creation and design. Each of her one-of-a-kind garments and accessories is sculpted from hand-dyed materials, including woven and knit fabrics of fine merino wool and silk and a unique hand-made cloth created of merino and silk fibers employing an ancient non-woven fabric-making process called felting.
The artists will be on-hand at BAG for a free opening reception on Friday, September 9, from 5 to 7 p.m.
