The newest exhibition at the Racine Art Museum began as a fun idea: Why not exhibit art on the outside of the downtown Racine building, instead of within its galleries?
Robb Woulfe hoped to bring that idea to life after he was named the museum’s executive director eighteen months ago – and he knew exactly the artist to make it happen. Amanda Browder is a large-scale textile artist known for installations that transform buildings’ exteriors with bright, sewn-together pieces of fabric.
Woulfe recalls first seeing Browder’s work at ArtPrize, an international competition in Grand Rapids, Michigan. “I loved [her] installation, what it represented and how the community was involved,” he says. “I knew at some point I would work with her, when the time was right.”
The resulting exhibition, “Amanda Browder: Zig and Zag” will turn the RAM building itself into a brightly colored piece of art. It will be unveiled during the museum’s inaugural “In/Between” art festival from Sept. 18-27 and will remain on view until mid-October. Throughout the festival, free visual and performing events will be hosted in both indoor and outdoor spaces.
But the run-up to “Zig and Zag” is nearly as important as the exhibition itself.
Browder’s projects are unique, in part, because it’s not just her doing the work. The Montana native – who came to Wisconsin as an undergrad at Beloit College, earned an MFA at UW-Madison, and is now based in Brooklyn – begins a project by collecting donated fabric from community members.
“We weren’t sure if we were going to get any fabric,” says Woulfe of RAM’s efforts. “We ended up having the opposite problem. So many people were dropping off materials.”
Each donation has a story behind it, he says: where the fabric came from, what it meant to the person who donated it. RAM will be documenting those stories in an oral history that will be shown during the exhibition.
Nominate Somebody Now!
The next step in Browder’s work is the sewing itself. The artist is recruiting community members to help sew the donated fabric into the long panels that will eventually decorate the building. That work will take place over a series of Community Sewing Days (July 21-31), during which people of all ages and abilities are invited to sew, trim and pin at locations across the city.
“The Sewing Days are in some way more important than the actual installation,” says Woulfe. “It was a chance to move beyond our museum walls. Racine’s got a lot of historical spaces that a lot of people don’t know about. We thought, ‘Why don’t we just animate the city?’ and people can discover a side of Racine they’ve never seen.”
Browder will be offering on-site instruction for anyone interested. “This is the easiest sewing you can do – it’s zig-zag stitch and no ironing,” she says. “You get to meditatively sew. The time evaporates. Within 20 minutes, everyone’s sewing. I try to make it user-friendly. The best part is everyone becomes an owner of the project.”
Community Sewing Days will be on the following dates, with locations noted:
- July 21: Dr. John Bryant Community Center, 601 Caron Butler Dr., 9 a.m.-4 p.m.
- July 22: Community Center at Douglas Park, 2221 Douglas Ave., 9 a.m.-2 p.m.
- July 23: Racine Art Museum’s Wustum Museum, 2519 Northwestern Ave., 1 p.m.-8 p.m.
- July 24: Sew ‘N’ Save of Racine, 3701 Durand Ave., 10 a.m.-5:30 p.m.
- July 25: Racine Farmers Market at Festival Hall, 5 Fifth St., 9 a.m.-1 p.m.
- July 27: Lake Oaks Senior Apartment Homes, 1916 Wisconsin Ave., 10 a.m.-5 p.m.
- July 28: Racine Public Library, 75 Seventh St., 4 p.m.-8 p.m.
- July 29: Sew ‘N’ Save of Racine, 3701 Durand Ave., 10 a.m.-5:30 p.m.
- July 30: Stitched Quilt Shop, 505 Sixth St., 1 p.m.-8 p.m.
- July 31: Unraveled Creative Studio, 614 Sixth St., noon-8 p.m.
“The whole idea is to really open up the doors to spaces that may or may not be creative and encourage them to be a space of interest and curiosity,” Browder says.
Even though she has already covered 35 buildings in fabric in her artistic practice, Browder is stretching her creative muscles in a different way with this RAM project.
“We have this sort of lattice work on the outside of the museum which looks like a loom,” Woulfe says. “Amanda said, ‘How interesting would it be to weave the museum?’ She’s never done that. This will actually be a first for her.”
“I just felt it conceptually made sense with the Racine Art Museum because it’s one of the best contemporary-craft museums in the United States,” says Browder. “This is contemporary with a capital C.”
