Waistcoat c. 1937

Curator: This piece, dating back to around 1937, is entitled "Waistcoat" and was crafted by Mae A. Clarke. It’s a pencil drawing on paper. Editor: Well, it strikes me as oddly haunting. Something so seemingly utilitarian rendered with such delicate lines on what looks like very fragile paper. The sparseness amplifies its presence somehow, as if it's a spectral vest. Curator: I see what you mean. Looking at the simplicity of the line work, one is invited to imagine the waistcoat's tactile presence, what its materials are, how it may have felt to wear. I imagine that was part of Clarke's artistic vision. The drawing acts as an invitation for speculation on the relationship between clothing and the wearer. Editor: Precisely. The geometry feels significant, a reduction to pure form. What's curious to me is how much labour goes unseen when we think about garments. Curator: Yes, the pencil, the paper, the tools used by Mae Clarke, bring attention to that invisible labour and to the role played by materials in social production and reproduction of design. Editor: The labor embedded in making, wearing, and preserving—a quiet defiance against the rapid turnover of trends. I find that deeply touching. Curator: Absolutely. Clarke transforms an everyday object into a vessel containing histories of social contexts, material labor, artistic processes, and memories that prompt an internal contemplation. Editor: And that initial feeling of hauntedness resolves itself as I grasp what I suspect is an intention to remind us of lives lived and work undertaken by unseen hands. Curator: In closing, "Waistcoat", isn't simply about the garment but becomes an invitation to reflect on how art connects to the mundane. Editor: Exactly, to think about clothes not as commodities but as things touched by human hands, that have served functions and might one day be valued for more than utility.