ARTIST STATEMENT
The artist has both an invitation and an obligation to use their voice in defiance of repression especially where humanity is in danger from malicious authority. My artistic practice with textiles which began in 1970, was not political, although I had created many drawings while a teenager and young adult that expressed feminist and social struggle. 2016 and the pandemic proved a turning point where I began to explore and address human rights with a more universal consciousness, which I have come to think of as Artivism. The seed for this body of work stems from anger mixed with ironic humor and a sense of the absurd. There are both personal and universal elements regarding pregnancy, maternity, and feminism within each piece. Thinking back, any success I haver experienced has been due to women and a few men with conscience, for which I am grateful.
ABOUT THE ARTIST
I was born in Chicago in 1949, one of four sisters all with art practices, a father who practiced medicine and wrote short stories and poems, and a mother who was an artist/activist. Both my parents were outspoken activists and organizers for human rights all their lives. I have one son, also an artist, whose father was a sculptor. I was infatuated with clothing and learned to sew while young from which my artwork is a natural progression. I spent some years in Mexico, completing high school and working on art in San Miguel de Allende. I worked in batik, and after a teaching career in art and music in Chicago public schools, I learned Shibori dying methods which eventually translated into my work of the past decade. I sing with The Mather Singers Choir in Evanston and study voice.
© Deborah Hirshfield