Mary Queen of the Universe

Mary Queen of the Universe

By: Steven and William Ladd

Presented by Museum of Art and Design at the Freedom Tower

This past week I visited the freedom tower which is currently showing the Ladd brothers. Their work consists mostly of fabric. To me, the recurring theme is texture. What they do is very meticulous and tedious. The get similar colored fabric and create squared arrangements. They take clothed boxes (which I'm guessing is where the fabric comes in), fill them up with coiled up fabric so that it creates spirals, the pack the box, and repeat the same process. The number of times they repeat the process depends on the final size of each art work. They basically create a mosaic with the boxes. 

They have huge works that cover an entire wall and they also have miniature works that you can fit in your pocket. The beauty in this is the repetitive patterns that create a gorgeous arrangement that evoke a serene place that my mind travels to when I look at the work. 

It is amazing the amount of fabric that they pack into a single box. What I also found fascinating is that they did different color-themed like chocolate is all brown fabric. They also have an all blue-toned one which looks like the ocean and an orange one that reminds me of leaves falling in the fall.

In the last room I visited, The artists had yet another mosaic. This time, it was even bigger and instead of boxes with fabric, it was a repeated figure on regular paper. It is astonishing to look at it from afar and move closer and closer to see the details. (take a look at the photos below)