Amulet
An exhibition of works by
Renata Daina
June 8 – June 17, 2024
Opening reception: Saturday, June 8 from 6 - 8pm
Keystone Gallery is pleased to announce Renata Daina Amulet on view June 8 through 17. This is her first solo exhibition with the gallery and presents handwoven tapestries, sculpture, and works on paper. There will be an opening reception on Saturday, June 8 from 6 - 8pm.
The language of textiles is translated throughout Daina’s tactile, mixed media practice. Labor-intensive techniques, such as hand weaving, rope coiling, and embroidery appear as foundation and embellishment on sculpture and tapestry. Geometric patterns adhering to the grid of horizontal and vertical threads meld into biomorphic forms mimicking organic growths and disintegrations.
Amulet explores the precious terrain between ancestral traditions and personal memories. Textiles handwoven by herself, her grandmother, and found fabrics made by unknown weavers are punctuated by painted and embroidered mark making. Intertwining natural fibers, such as raw linen, and synthetic threads emphasize symbiotic rather than dualistic notions. These soft talismans conjure earthly and otherworldly desires that are informed by new materialist theories and pre-Christian cosmologies.
Methods reflect spiraling life cycles and future (post)human landscapes. Laborious techniques such as coiling are repetitive and circular in motion; the technique mimicking our cyclical relationship with nature. Drawings based on familial weaving patterns appear like glitched out abstract geometries reveal the timeless knowledge of our ancestors. Handwoven textiles and repurposed materials move seamlessly between surface textures and multi-dimensional structures, shielding what surrounds us and what is within us.
Renata Daina was born in the United States and raised in Australia where she learned traditional Lithuanian textile crafts from her grandmother, and is a fifth generation weaver. Daina received a BFA with Honors Cum Laude from the University of Southern California, and studied Fashion & Textile Design at the University of Technology Sydney. Growing up in a creative household of theater artists she was greatly involved in on and off-stage processes. She built on these experiences in the past nearly ten years making costumes, installations, and props for advertising, retail, and television. Daina was a 2022 Fiber Artist in Residence at Township10, and has exhibited work in Australia, Europe, and the United States.