Sonya Clark

Photograph courtesy of Naoko Wowsugi

Portfolio of Artwork 904-907

Sonya Clark is a visual artist who uses human hair and textiles as the media for her art. As I worked to prepare her introduction for this project, I discovered another practice that distinguishes her from the other artists in this issue: she has written a number of different artist statements. In fact, Sonya Clark informed me that she has “lots and lots of artist statements.” “If you go to my website,” she writes, “you will find artist statements for each medium I use as well as each conceptual body of work.” Unlike those, the following artist statement from 2013 is more general; it can be used to assist in the reading of Sonya Clark’s artwork in general:

I use craft and materials to investigate identity. Simple objects become cultural interfaces. Through them I navigate accord and discord. When trying to unravel complex issues, I am instinctively drawn to things that connect to my personal narrative as a point of departure: a comb or a strand of hair. Charged with agency, simple objects have the mysterious ability to reflect or absorb us. I find my image, my personal story, in an object. But it is also the object’s ability to act as a rhizome, the multiple ways in which it can be discovered or read by a wide audience that draws me in. To sustain my practice, I milk the object, its potential, its image, and its materiality. I manipulate the object in a formal manner to engage the viewer in conversation about collective meaning. If we unravel a cloth together, what do we learn in the process? What is the connection between combs, hair, and textiles? Can a strand of hair tell a life story or a whole cultural history? I trust that my stories, your stories, our stories are held in the object. In this way, the everyday “thing” becomes a lens through which we may better see one another. A visual vocabulary derived from object and image forms a language ranging from the vernacular to the political to the poetic.

In my interview with Sonya Clark conducted via email during August 2015, she discussed further her use of materials and provided insight into her artistic production through yet another of her artist statements.

ROWELL:

Am I correct in assuming that you have two artist statements online? Do they complement each other—with the one extending what you say in the other?

CLARK:

I have multiple statements on my website. Last I counted there were over fifteen. I like to address different bodies of work, ways of working, material choices, and concepts. When I revisit those statements, I want to continue to edit and adjust them. (The statement I provided by email is the overarching one.) Once the work has left the studio it continues to have a life not only in the minds of the audience—I remain in dialogue with it. The ideas and concepts continue to evolve. I love that complexity. I liken the work to a sponge or a mirror. What it reflects and absorbs is in constant flux.

ROWELL:

Will you briefly describe the kind of artwork you were making before you decided to use human hair and textiles as your media? What led you to these two different materials that you would use to make your artwork?

CLARK:

I cannot remember a time when I did not use textiles as a point of departure in my work. When I went to the Art Institute of Chicago it was to study in the Fiber Department with Nick Cave, Ann Wilson, and Joan Livingstone. I made the decision to focus on textiles because like most craft based media (clay, glass, wood, etc.) humans have been expressing themselves through those materials for thousands and thousands of years. And because the materials have been used to make utilitarian objects, the audience has been interacting with them for many, many generations. With textiles, think about how often you are touching cloth. We are in constant contact with...