Garry Noland

My work refers to two themes. Initially I think of my grandmothers’ quilts and rugs made from scraps of used cloth. They wouldn’t have called themselves artists but they did what artists do: transforming material and experience into new identities. Secondly I think of something Galway Kinnell wrote: ‘the only human context is the non-human world. The continents, because we are ON them, are seen as positive. The seas become “not positive” or negative. Each requires the other for definition.” The leap is to conclude that the continents we ride on and the water around us are like letters…the letters of the alphabet AND the continents require the “negative” spaces. We assign and derive meaning from/to both. The globe is a text. Pattern is important in my work. Pattern records this balance of positive/negative equalities. While there are abundant random natural patterns, less random are patterns of process in nature. The rhythms of daily/seasonal change, tidal flow and migrations exemplify patterns that make chance possible. Pattern describes process.

Artist-in-residence from 2011 to 2013.

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