A luscious conversation has been going on recently between textile art and painting. Needlework is traditionally an undersung domestic art that is the domain of women. Painting is historically the vaunted domain of men held up as geniuses creating masterworks that reshape the way we see. That binary sets up juicy territory to explore in between. Mary Tooley Parker’s hooked rugs spring from there. They play with the perspective, vibrant color, and narrative of painting and the tactile comfort of textiles. She makes them entirely by hand, including dyeing and mixing colors and cutting dyed strips in varied fabrics to hook into her linen matrix.
February 27, 2024
