Tallahassee Democrat: No medium is off-limits for fiber artist Tenee Hart
MFA 15 Tenee Hart was featured in the Tallahassee Democrat for her inclusion in COCA’s 30 Under 30 Exhibition!
The strangest item hanging up in her studio is an inflated pig intestine, gifted by a colleague who was studying the material. Transfixed by its translucent and foggy qualities, the organ serves as a silent muse for Hart’s ponderings.
Amanda Sieradski writes that Hart reveals untold stories of women facing societal pressures. In Cestoda, she used tattered gauze and pearls to represent 1930s fad where women ingested tapeworms to lose weight. In 80Hg, a giant bedframe spills over with metallic fabrics, exposing an ancient contraception practice of Chinese concubines. Communicating these extremes is important to Hart, as she wants to inform viewers, even if it leaves them a bit unsettled. “The beautiful thing about art is that it can be interpreted by anyone,” says Hart. “I try not to take bad reactions to my artwork to heart, because if you do that you’re not going to get very far.” Hart’s installations have been displayed around the Southeastern US, including Kentucky, South Carolina, and Georgia. Her family shows bighearted support for her endeavors and successes. Hart’s brother collects her paintings and her father has designs of converting the basement of her childhood home into an art gallery.
She continued to work sculpturally and transitioned into fibers during her graduate studies, earning her MFA from Florida State this past spring. Her artistic processes develop from a concept or theme and are driven by research. From there, Hart begins a series of sketches that act as an organizational tool, though she finds the piece rarely turns out as planned. “Those are happy mistakes if it doesn’t turn out like the sketch,” reassures Hart. “It’s kind of like an evolution of the process. If it does come out like the sketch, I feel I didn’t learn as much.” Much of Hart’s work explores women in relation to their biology, histories, oppression, and struggles, and the push and pull between past and present day ideals and expectations. She loves working with domestic objects, such as in her work, Womb Veils, which used shower caps, a dissected wedding dress and veil, and lace tablecloths.