Elaine Duncan

Pacific Portals: Mexico

Last fall I wove a small format tapestry for entry into the American Tapestry Alliance unjuried small format tapestry exhibition to be shown at the Long Beach Public Library in conjunction with HGA’s Convergence 2012.  The requirements were that the piece not exceed 10″ by 10″.  Our local Tapis group decided to participate in a group entry.  Almost everyone participated.  First though, we needed a theme for our group.  We decided to play on the word Pacific in the title and use it to include the countries that border the Pacific Ocean.  Each person chose a country they had an affiliation to.  It could be they had lived there, visited there, had friends or family there.  There were two rules:  each person had to use in their piece colour#826 in DMC cotton embroidery floss (this could be a small amount used or very little used) and also they had to weave the Pacific Ocean coastline in the appropriate place on their tapestry.  For example, in my piece dealing with Mexico, the water would be on the left side as viewed on a map or globe.  Someone choosing Japan, the ocean would be woven on the right side.  We had one member, Audrie Sands, choose Hawaii…so the ocean is on all four sides.  This was a wonderful group experience and we are looking forward to seeing all the tapestries in one place as that had not happened yet.  A catalogue is also available for purchase through ATA:  www.americantapestryalliance.org.

My piece represents Mexico, my “other” home, with the ruins and pyramids for historical interests, the textiles for their art and culture, and of course, the ocean for their beaches.  I experimented with this piece, weaving the main body from the bottom up, while the ocean was woven separately in the other direction and then attached the two shaped pieces.  I think it worked!