Erika Diamond
Artist credit: Erika Diamond, Three Fates Floating, hand woven alpaca tapestry, 2018
Erika Diamond, North Carolina | textile
Residency Dates: March 26 – May 17, 2018
Escape/Run, Hide, Fight
Resident Artist Erika Diamond and students from McLain Community High School
Exhibition dates: Thursday, May 17 - May 31, 2018
While in residence at PlatteForum, Resident Artist Erika Diamond has created a series of bulletproof Kevlar vests designed for queer individuals who have had a positive impact on her life and work. Questioning who is safe and who is valued, these garments address the potential for personal safety to become part of our contemporary fashion vernacular. This ongoing project will be shown alongside Diamond’s tapestry work depicting hypothetical people in emergency instruction scenarios. Both reflect the vulnerability and self-preservation negotiated during human interaction.
Exhibiting alongside this work will be the artworks of the students of McLain Community High School, who learned the ancient art of tapestry weaving as well as practical survival skills like net-making from Erika Diamond. Using textile techniques to ask questions around the role of the individual within the group, students investigated questions around how we can maintain our individuality, yet still remain part of the collective cloth; is it possible to progress in our lives if we leave others behind; what invisible fences does one build around their self and how does one mend fences in order to help each other survive?
About Erika Diamond
German-born, Erika Diamond is a conceptual artist using sculpture, textile, and performance techniques. She received a BFA in Sculpture from Rhode Island School of Design and an MFA in Fiber from Virginia Commonwealth University. She has exhibited nationally and internationally and her costumes have been commissioned by Charlotte Ballet. Residencies include Little Italy Peninsula Arts Center in Mount Holly, NC and McColl Center for Visual Art. She received a Regional Artist Project Grant in 2015 from the Arts & Science Council of NC. Diamond is currently Assistant Director of Galleries at Chautauqua Institution and teaches at Virginia Commonwealth University in the Craft/Material Studies Department.
"My work addresses the vital and fleeting qualities of human contact.I use my body to investigate the possibility of immortality, the commemoration of touch, and the thresholds between others and myself. Examining common materials and universal gestures, I document the individual traces we leave behind and the indelible marks we leave upon each other."
Our Resident Artist program is generously supported by OZ Architecture
