Christy Matson: Moonshadow

In her work, Christy Matson considers images, how they read and feel, how we make and think about them. Matson's works are intellectual, emotional and physical. New pieces like "Moonshadow" and "Middle Distance," both of which are included in the show, present landscape as an experience of sensing, observing and responding. Is this the play of light across water? The curve of a hill? The bend in a river? Matson's works embrace the literal and abstract aspects of her motifs, allowing the viewer an opportunity to parse color, shape and line; to delve down into the warp and weft of the grid; to find and enjoy subtle shifts in hue, value and temperature.

Matson's pieces begin with drawings and watercolors done on-site that she then translates into the bits and bytes of the Jacquard loom of which she is a master. One of the works in the exhibition, "Braided River," presents as its title indicates, moving water, braided not only in terms of itself as image, but also in terms of the stitched passages that make it up. Christy Matson's work reminds us of how our minds can build from discrete moments - a stitch, for example - deep, resonant sensibility.

Matson's works have an embrace, a gentle feel, a play of emotions that asks us to engage. Monica Obniski, curator of Christy Matson's 2022 solo show at the Milwaukee Art Museum, notes that, "though she works with textiles, Matson thinks of herself as a painter. Her woven pictures participate in minimalism, abstraction, and decoration and, hung on a wall, are not utilitarian. She employs historical weaving structures and techniques to explore memory; the gendered history of textile production, long considered a feminized form of labor; and issues around sustainability. Matson’s work honors the traditional medium and reflects the strong, recent embrace of fiber by contemporary artists."

For her part, Christy Matson writes, "I think about textiles in relationship to body, in that there is a certain kind of physicality we have in inhabiting our own bodies. On my loom, I can make what appear to be organic and flowing lines, raise certain areas, put in a line of yarn, or material. I think about it as if I had a pen or paintbrush." A runner, beach-goer and avid hiker, Matson depicts the California in which she has lived and worked for most of her life. We see the land against the ocean; smell the sage on the wind; witness the 'green flash’ of the sun as it slips beneath a wine-dark sea. Christy Matson’s work opens up our sense of things, encouraging us to consider ourselves and the world around us.