Jade Yumang / Exchanging Glances

This series examines the fraught lineage of a craft technique and identity formation by considering its hybrid nature. Specifically, it looks at how filet lace, a fine embroidered net structure, was introduced to the Philippines during the Spanish occupation, and how it then evolved for the American market. This is compared to the creation of an ambiguous Asian American persona by gay pornstar Brandon Lee, who happens to be Filipino but never played up his heritage during his fame. Although the reference is to a particular craft, the work is not a recreation, but rather, it is used as a historical anchor. The imprinting of a fabricated persona onto a fickle craft acts as a loose filter where desire can flow freely even in an imposed grid.

Jade Yumang was born in Quezon City, Philippines, grew up in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, immigrated to unceded Coast Salish territories in Vancouver, BC, Canada, and currently lives in Chicago, IL, USA, which sits on the traditional homelands of the people of the Council of Three Fires, the Ojibwe, Potawatomi, and Odawa as well as the Menominee, Miami, and Ho-Chunk nations. They received an MFA at Parsons School of Design with Departmental Honors in 2012 and a BFA Honors at the University of British Columbia in 2008. He has shown nationally and internationally in several museums and galleries, such as the Leslie-Lohman Museum of Art, the Brooklyn Museum, John Michael Kohler Arts Center, Museum of Arts and Design, Craft Contemporary, Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art, Des Moines Art Center, Western Exhibitions, and ONE Archives. They are a recipient of several grants from the Canada Council for the Arts and the BC Arts Council. Jade is an Associate Professor in the Department of Fiber and Material Studies at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.

Qianwen Yu: Music of the Loom

Qianwen Yu is a Chicago-based interdisciplinary artist and independent animator whose practice bridges the worlds of weaving and music. With a background in architecture and drawing, Qianwen translates musical compositions into woven textures and creates symphonies from weaving drafts, exploring the deep connections between these art forms. Her textile works have been showcased at the historic Black Mountain College Museum + Arts Center, Hyde Park Art Center, and Woman Made Gallery. In 2024, her work will be featured in solo exhibitions at Evanston Art Center and Ignition Project Space, alongside presentations at the Textile Society of America Symposium and the ReVIEWING Black Mountain College International Conference. Specializing in hand-drawn and stop-motion animation, Qianwen frequently incorporates textiles into her animations, further examining the interplay between mediums. She holds an MFA in Film, Video, New Media, and Animation from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.

Qianwen Yu is a Chicago-based interdisciplinary artist and animator specializing in weaving, stop motion, and sound. She holds an MFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, and her work has been exhibited at Black Mountain College Museum + Arts Center, Hyde Park Art Center, and Woman Made Gallery. In 2024, she will present solo exhibitions at Evanston Art Center and Ignition Project Space. Qianwen is also scheduled to present her work at the Textile Society of America Symposium and ReVIEWING Black Mountain College International Conference.

JohnClaud Ruder / Silver Tails; Or, a Head of Heat, as Eve drifts by

JohnClaud Valentine Ruder is a Chicago-based fiber artist. Their practice curiously dances through bodily grief and queer embodiment. Binding internal and external, memory and moment in mind and hand, their laborious knotted woven embellishments transubstantiate muddled materials into dreary dreamful homebodies. Like sheep before bed and candied clouds of cotton
ball or faux fur, Ruder makes home appliques into emotive inhabited art objects.

Image: Jade Yumang, Obedience Training. Discharged dye, cotton, sublimation dye, mercerized cotton yarn, fiberfill, cotton piping cord, and bamboo
60″ x 30″ x 24″

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Tags: Chicago, Humboldt Park, Ignition project space, Jade Yumang, Jade Yumang / Qianwen Yu / JohnClaud Ruder, JohnClaud Ruder, Qianwen Yu