Shelly Sazdanoff

Name: Shelly Sazdanoff

Studio location: Portland, Oregon

Website / social links: shellysazdanoff.com, @shellysazdanoff

Loom type or tool preference: 2’x3’ Maple table top extendable frame loom

Years weaving: 5

Fiber inclination: flax linen

 

 

1. How did you discover weaving and was what your greatest resource as a beginner?

Throughout my life, I’ve always been creating in some capacity. Whether making music in a band, working with a creative publication or more recently doing floral design, I have consistently been drawn to the arts. After moving to Portland 5 years ago, I came across some weavers on social media and realized I wanted to learn how to weave. I’d never had formal training but just bought a small frame loom, did research using copied photos from books and what limited online tutorials here were at the time and gave it a try. The moment I began, something clicked in me. It felt natural and as if I had found a part of me I didn’t know about. The idea of the slowness, the repetition, the solitude and this new exercise in movement really drew me in. I have been weaving and maturing in my craft almost everyday since. It’s meditative and counter-intuitive to our fast-pace consumer culture and I love it for that.

2. How do you define your practice – do you consider yourself an artist / craftsperson / weaver / designer / general creative or a combination of those? Is this definition important to you?

I would say I think of myself as an artist. With the mixed-media element in my work there are multiple stages in the process of a completed piece. I weave primarily but also paint and/or cast concrete as well.

3. What is your creative process, from the initial idea to the finished piece? Are there specific weave structures, looms, or fibers that are important to your process?

Some pieces are sketched and planned beforehand, while others start with an intuitive idea. But as the loom is warped and I begin to weave, everything must be thought out and calculated due to the minimal nature of the design. When I first began, I never realized there would be so much math in what I do! Once woven and stretched, I continue to move at a pace where I am able to pay attention to the details and carefully execute the concrete element as there is little room for mistakes at this stage or the piece could be in jeopardy.

As far as fiber goes, linen has been extremely important to my process. In fact I have worked almost exclusively with flax for the last 3 years with just a few exceptions of cotton and wool. I am drawn to its crispness, slight sheen and the way it counteracts against the concrete. I find this beautiful contradiction in materials that lends perfectly to what I am trying to voice in my work.

4. Does your work have a conceptual purpose or greater meaning? If so, do you center your making around these concepts?

My work explores texture, line and angle as well as juxtaposition. It’s about how the materials and textures work together in both fluidity and in contrast finding a balance. I am drawn to the subtle characteristics of the natural fiber; the pieces of stray flax, the slight shifts in shade and thickness, the variation of warp lines because it is handwoven and the organic, earthly fiber against the rough concrete and clean lines. The pieces are minimal but upon closer view, there is a world full of subtleties; a conversation happening between materials.

The work is about control; both our grasp for it as well as our lack of it. The linear angles and patterns are as much about our human aim for perfection as they are about visual perfection. But still, the work is made by human hands and will therefore have human error by default, but those moments of intersection are pivotal and beautiful.

 

5. What is your favorite part of the weaving process and why? What’s your least favorite?

I love the process as a whole. The movement in each step has a rhythm to it, from warping at the beginning to finishing at the end. I love that my muscle memory has developed patterns in how I specifically weave, making the connection between myself and what I create feel much deeper.

6. Do you sell your work or make a living from weaving? If so, what does that look like and how has that affected your studio practice?

I do show and sell my work but I haven’t let it affect my studio practice. I make the work that I want to make based on what inspires me. Selling a piece, while always an honor and financially helpful, isn’t my primary goal in making art. So I have been able to hold that element with open hands and not put too much stock in it.

7. Where do you find inspiration?

I find inspiration in architecture, lines in shadows, contemporary art, design, French new wave films, the book of Ecclesiastes.

8. What other creatives do you admire – weavers, artists, entrepreneurs – and why?

First and foremost, I admire the female artists who persevered and made their way in male-dominated environments and who had vital artistic points of view; Agnes Martin, Carmen Herrera, Agnes Varda, Sheila Hicks, Anni Albers, Anne Truitt. I am also very much inspired by the lines of Sol Lewit’s wall drawings, the texture of Anselm Keifer and the angles of John McLaughlin.

9. If you could no longer weave, what would you do instead?

Begin painting and continue in floral design.

Do you have any upcoming exhibits, talks, or events the community should know about?

I have an upcoming two-woman show opening September 27 at Ritual Dyes here in Portland. I will be showing work alongside, Elizabeth McMurtry, who does incredibly delicate pen drawings.