Marian Bijlenga
Dutch Textile Artist
“I AM FASCINATED BY DOTS, LINES & CONTOURS, BY THEIR RHYTHMICAL MOVEMENTS BUT ALSO BY THE EMPTY SPACE THEY CONFINE. INSTEAD OF DRAWING ON PAPER, I DRAW IN SPACE BY USING TEXTILE AS A MATERIAL. I WORK WITH THREAD, FABRIC & HORSEHAIR, MATERIALS THAT ARE SOFT, LIGHT, FLEXIBLE & OPEN TO ENDLESS DEVELOPMENT. LEAVING SPACE BETWEEN THE STRUCTURE & THE WALL THE OBJECT IS FREED FROM ITS BACKGROUND & INTERACTS WITH THE WHITE WALL. IT BECOMES WHAT I CALL A ‘SPATIAL DRAWING’.”
In the early 1990s, Bijlenga’s drawing tool narrowed to a single material: horsehair. The fibre provides the necessary strength and flexibility to construct embroidered compositions of lines and dots. Bijlenga uses horsehair to work in a more direct and free manner. When displayed with the right amount of natural light, the work looks to float just in front of the wall in beguiling defiance of gravity.
