We had the pleasure of meeting Jen Bervin a little while ago.

She lives just a few blocks from Textile Arts Center, and came in to introduce herself and her work after noticing the “Congratulations” on our fence by Kathryn Pannepacker, tagged on our Opening Night.

(courtesy of Joetta Maue)

Jen’s work is, in short, incredibly beautiful, subtle, and poetic.

Her website describes:

“Poet and visual artist Jen Bervin’s work brings together text and textile in a practice that encompasses large-scale art works, artist books, poetry, and archival research. Her books include The Desert, Nets, A Non- Breaking Space, The Red Box, and Under What Is Not Under. She has new works forthcoming from Granary Books and Ugly Duckling this fall.

Bervin’s work has been shown at The Walker Art Center and is in many special collections including The J. Paul Getty Museum. She has received fellowships in art and writing from The Josef and Anni Albers Foundation, The New York Foundation for the Arts, Centrum, The MacDowell Colony, and The Camargo Foundation and is an editor-at-large for jubilat. She lives and works in Brooklyn, New York.” (www.jenbervin.com)

I’m in awe of her installation piece-in-progress, The River, is a 230 ft. panoramic scale model of the Mississippi River composed of hand-sewn silver sequins. Installed on the ceiling, the model (one inch to one mile) shows the river mapped from the geocentric perspective, from inside the earth’s interior looking up at the riverbed.

(all images courtesy Jen Bervin)

We were thrilled when Jen asked us if she could use the fence outside of Textile Arts Center to do some woven graffiti. As most who are savvy in real estate know, once you bring artwork and artists to a location property value should rise. Unfortunately, TAC building management did not agree, and asked her to stop before she could get too far.

The start of a warp for double-weave graffiti.

Jen at the fence

Don’t worry — we’ll be trying again soon.

Curator of our January show, Scott Henstrand, will be asking Jen to participate in an evening of poetry as part of the lecture series associated with Missing/Missed. If you haven’t submitted to the Call for Entries yet, do it! We can’t wait to see what you have to share.