The Seventh Street Gallery in Fernandina Beach, FL invites you to “Invitation to Imagine,” an one-woman show introducing the extraordinary art of Amelia Island resident Jayne Gaskins. Each piece, meticulously created, is a marriage of two diverse mediums: modern digital photography and textile art, one of the oldest known mediums. How she combines the two is a process Gaskins calls “fiberography.”
Options by Jayne Gaskins
Multiple digital images set the stage as Gaskins creates the scene she envisions, manipulating an image before transferring the completed design to cloth, to be overlaid with thread. This, in a thimble, is the definition of “fiberography.” Literally, it is painting with thread.
I really don’t care if you call my work photography, fiber art, mixed media, or even painting. It’s art. Everything else is irrelevant”, says Gaskins.
Gaskins works with a needle and thread, blending, overlaying and interspersing colors to create subtle hues, textures and realism as a painter would with a brush. Portions are heavily “painted” with a sewing machine and multiple colors of thread to produce a painterly effect, then stuffed and sculpted with small hand stitches (trapunto quilted). The effect is a photo-realistic image with a heavy relief. The viewer can hardly resist touching a piece, it looks so real. Is feeling believing?
Another hallmark of Gaskins’ work is her use of strong directional light. “I am fascinated with the effects of light and light sources, and have been heavily influenced by Rembrandt and Vermeer. Both used strong directional light, but in different ways, to achieve dramatic results and I try to emulate these effects in my work.”
Jayne Gaskins
Gaskins’ work has been exhibited in galleries and museums throughout the US and Europe and has earned numerous awards for excellence. Gaskins’ art has been shown in prestigious exhibits such as Xe Triennale Internationale des Mini-Textiles in Angers, France, Quilt National, and FiberArt International, and it has been published in books such as 500 Art Quilts by Lark Publishing and The Natural World: Profiles of Major Artists Galleries and Art Quilt Portfolio: People and Portraits both by Martha Sielman. Gaskins holds a BFA in Graphic Design and an MBA with a double concentration in Marketing and Management. In 2006 she retired from a long successful career in communications and moved to a barrier island off the Atlantic coast of Florida where she devotes herself to her art and extensive travels. To see more work by Gaskins go to JayneGaskins.com
Invitation to Imagine
Opening Reception: Saturday, February 8, from 5 to 8 p.m.
The show is also open on Saturday, February 15 and 22, from 9 -1pm or on weekdays by appt.
Seventh Street Gallery, 14 South 7th Street, Fernandina Beach, FL
Call (904) 432-8330 for more information.