WE-ed

WE-ed is a large-scale installation in which translucent, cross-stitched tapestries of grass blades and common yard weeds hang from the ceiling, each trimmed to twelve feet, roughly twice the height of a human body. Stitched on blue construction debris netting, the panels fill the gallery like a field, with yarn roots trailing from the bottom of each one. Visitors wander through a space that compresses in some places and opens in others, becoming newly aware of their own bodies and of how close they are to one another. At this scale the viewer feels as small as an insect, an individual within a larger system.

The title plays on the first word of the U.S. Constitution, “We,” and on the question of who gets counted as part of it and who is treated as a weed to be pulled. The American lawn serves as the central metaphor: a carefully maintained symbol of control and belonging that, like a nation, is not a natural order but an ideal sustained by labor, rules, and participation. Continuing the themes of my earlier project MADE THE USA, the work honors the repetitive, often invisible labor of cross-stitching, women’s work, and the people who tend our landscapes and communities. WE-ed invites viewers to reflect on belonging, power, and individualism, and leaves them with a sense of agency in the systems they are part of.

My vision is to create 50 to 100 tapestries that fill an entire space and build a narrative, expanding on my understanding of how the idea of “WE” is created. With each installation, I can reconfigure the work to reflect what I have learned along the way, so WE-ed continues to evolve as my understanding of how “WE” is made grows.