My Covid Year

2020 began in the usual way. This overshot piece begins in the usual way with figurative pattern. Disruption quickly follows.

Spring 202: Yellow and red fabric is left over from mask making for Valley Hospital.

The colors of the yellow and red fabric represent human fluids, urine and blood. Scenes of over-crowded hospitals and patients dying alone haunt.

The orderly overshot pattern seems to disappear in the white area which follows. The red supplementary wefts represent blood.

The glistening plastic wefts are the tears shed during the past year.

The paper weft represents our fragility.

Out of the gash in the center pour blood and tears. This is the amfortas wound, a wound which never heals. Society is gravely wounded by divisions accentuated by and brought to the surface by Covid-19.

Above this wound things seem to settle a bit though blood and tears still flow.

The ordered overshot pattern is no longer apparent. Society is disrupted. Memories of this past year and its terror, loss and fear linger. Like an amfortas wound these memories may never go away. The black wire at the top reminds me of a prison’s razor wire fencing.

Will society be overcome by the losses, of life and work? Will I look upon other people with suspicion? Will I cling to my mask like a life preserver? What will it take for the individual and society to overcome thoughts and conditions which cause separation?

Materials Used

The white warp is the very end of a warp, its short length barely usable. The red weft, like the warp, are from decades old cones of cottolin I bought from School Products in Manhattan. The fabric is left over from making masks in the spring of 2020. That activity gave me some comfort and purpose during those terrifying days. The white paper is from a bag of takeout food, the plastic something I struggle to reduce the presence of in my life. I found the black wire amidst my wire working supplies. This piece was woven on a Louet Compu-dobby, an amazing loom which allows one to weave with little waste. The bar holding the warp was just about touching the rear-most shaft. I used a long needle to thread the final weft picks. Eight inches of warp was unusable as it was threaded through the heddles and I included it in at the top of this piece.