Mend Poetry | Mend Links | Quilt Mending

The 2008/9 exhibit of art, artifacts, books, and related programs at Proteus Gowanus revolves around the theme MEND. From mending a piece of fabric to solving global problems, we will explore the theme from a multiplicity of perspectives and disciplines at a time when “fixing things,” from the mundane to the profound, seems increasingly out of our reach.

A view of the Mend Exhibit

A view of the Mend Exhibit

“Cheap fossil fuel allows us to pay distant others to process our food for us, to entertain us and to (try to) solve our problems, with the result that there is very little we know how to accomplish for ourselves. Think for a moment of all the things you suddenly need to do for yourself when the power goes out.”
Michael Pollan, “Why Bother?” NYT Magazine , 4-20-08

In a culture that increasingly resorts to throwing things away when they break, we will begin by exploring the disappearing skills and tools of repair, from darning socks and repairing shoes to fixing watches and mending clothing, including stitching, spinning, and knitting.

“Wendy’s favourite time for sewing and darning was after they had all gone to bed. Then, as she expressed it, she had a breathing time for herself; and she occupied it in making new things for them, and putting double pieces on the knees, for they were all most frightfully hard on their knees. When she sat down to a basketful of their stockings, every heel with a hole in it, she would fling up her arms and exclaim, “Oh dear, I am sure I sometimes think spinsters are to be envied!”
From Peter Pan by J M Barrie 1911

Esther K. Smith’s mended sweater

“Pity Taraska’s gone…He was worth his weight in gold. Patch your boots or repair your watch – he’d do anything.”
Dr. Zhivago, Boris Pasternak

We will look at the methods and tools of saving, recycling, conserving and archiving, from books to household refuse. We will look at art, books and objects related to regeneration of the environment, of the human body (surgery, medicine, death), and of society’s ills, including a library of books about social visionaries. Our 2009 Proteotypes publication about the Brooklyn social visionary Alfred Tredway White, produced in collaboration with the Brooklyn Historical Society, will explore White’s many contributions to “mending” the lives of NYC residents in the early 1900s.

Detail, Ellen Driscoll's landscape of recycled cartons

“Man is born broken. He lives by mending. The grace of God is glue.”
 Eugene O’Neill

MEND participants include:

Ellen Banks-Feld, Jenny Bevill, Jen Bervin, Mariella Bisson, Stephanie Brody-Lederman, Rosamond Casey, Sasha Chavchavadze, Libby Clarke, Donna Maria De Creeft, Ellen Driscoll, Laure Drogoul, Joanna Ebenstein, Janice Everett, Charles Goldman, Paula Hayes, Sophie Herbert, Jeanne Liotta, David Mahfouda, Susan Newmark, Heidi Nielson, Jim Nightlinger, Debra Pearlman, Pam Peterson, Herbert Pfostl, Chris Piazza, Tamara Pittman, Karla Roberts, Esther K Smith, Andrea Spiros, Alan Rosner, Lance Rutledge, Naftali Beane Rutter, Jeffrey Schiff, Erik Schurink, Tony Stanzione, Sally Mara Sturman, Annette Tacconelli, Robert The, Wendy Walker, James Walsh, Matthew Wills, The Brooklyn Museum Libraries and Archives.

Work by the above participants is rotated throughout the year. If you are interested in seeing work by a particular participant, please email or call ahead to check availability.

2008/9 Proteus Gowanus MEND Correspondents will offer a multitude of interdisciplinary ideas on the theme MEND over the course of the year: Joanna Ebenstein, Janice Everett, Lydia Matthews, Herbert Pfostl and Martin Skoble.

Detail, Laure Drogoul's Scentorium

 

“Use three physicians still, first doctor Quiet, next doctor Merry-man and doctor Dyet.”
Schola Salernitana, translated from the latin by James Harington, 1607