Beadwork on Purse (Tech. demonstration) 1935 - 1942

Harriette Gale, who lived from 1855 to 1995, made this unfinished beadwork on a purse at an unknown date, and seeing it this way is really special. I love how the image of a building emerges like a brightly colored dream out of the pale fabric, it reminds me of my own painting process. The artist is really working through the image, finding forms, and there’s a real beauty in how the image is only half there. The beads themselves are so tactile, I can almost feel the texture between my fingers, and you can see the artist's counting as a kind of mark making. That transition, from bare canvas to the beaded image, is so powerful and so present, like the drawing is a ghost of the image to come. Gale’s beadwork reminds me of some of the obsessive detail of the Chicago Imagists, Christina Ramberg in particular, another artist who was interested in what happens under the surface. It is a special thing to see the working of an artwork, and to be reminded that, mostly, art is about the work.