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February Issue 2005
Mepkin Abbey in Moncks Corner, SC, Features Works by Susan Hull Walker
Inspired
by the Jewish Tallit, or Prayer Shawl, Susan Hull Walker has reinterpreted
these garments which wrap and shape the body in its interior repose.
Why Not Be Turned Into Fire, an exhibition of hand-woven
prayer shawls rendered in miniature form, will be displayed in
the Little Gallery in the Mepkin Abbey Store in Moncks Corner,
SC, through Feb. 27, 2005.
The miniature shawls reflect upon three different cycles in the contemplative life. The first cycle depicts the seven offices in the Liturgy of the Hours, as described by St. Benedict and practiced by the monks of Mepkin Abbey. These pieces convey the artist's experience of Plainsong, or communal prayer, offered in daily rhythm. The use of the stripe in its many variations, suggests the edges of solitude and community, of work and prayer.
The second
cycle offers a personal expression of the interior pulse of prayer.
Drawing from the inherent structure of plainweave - each warp
thread intersecting with each weft thread forming thereby a cross
- the artist studies the intimacies of her own heart at prayer.
The third cycle, Communion, suggest a movement out from the contemplative
center to the cosmic or universal embrace of our Oneness. The
circle, her, completes the cross. All is one.
Walker has studied religion and textile design. As a textile artist she studied at the Savannah School of Art and Design, Arrowmont School of Arts and Craft (TN) and the Weaving Center (NH). She has exhibited in numerous galleries in Charleston as well as in the American Artists for Diversity in Marrakech, Morocco. Walker was curator of the Mosaics of Mary exhibition in Charleston (May 2004).
For further
information check our SC Institutional Gallery listings, call
the gallery at 843/761-5509 or at (www.mepkinabby.org).
Carolina Arts is published monthly by Shoestring Publishing Company, a subsidiary of PSMG, Inc. Copyright© 2004 by PSMG, Inc., which published Charleston Arts from July 1987 - Dec. 1994 and South Carolina Arts from Jan. 1995 - Dec. 1996. It also publishes Carolina Arts Online, Copyright© 2004 by PSMG, Inc. All rights reserved by PSMG, Inc. or by the authors of articles. Reproduction or use without written permission is strictly prohibited. Carolina Arts is available throughout North & South Carolina.