Artist Alice Spencer will be in the gallery. Stop in to discuss her work in Emergent.

My previous work focused on textiles and their social and symbolic significance in traditional societies. The work was improvisational but used a vocabulary of existing motifs.

 My goal for the current work was to pull new patterns from primary sources.  

To generate ideas for patterns I used natural materials that I found underfoot -- dry grass, twigs and other natural debris. I made prints using handfuls of this material thrown onto light sensitive paper; then I mirror reflected sections of the prints to turn them into bilateral forms. I intended this process to be a first step in creating more complex patterns.

 What happened was unexpected: the process conjured imagery that suggested new forms of life.  

 I discontinued the pattern making process, made the images into stencils and printed them. 

This is the body of work that emerged.

— Alice Spencer