Sarah Kusa, 2021 McKnight Fiber Artist Fellow
At the heart of McKnight Fiber Artist Fellow Sarah Kusa’s work is the awareness that life can change at any moment, and that as humans, we are all vulnerable. Says Kusa, “We are waking up to this reality, collectively, during pandemic times, but this recognition hit home for me personally as a young adult when unexpected tragedy touched my family. The art I make is not about loss, but its presence as a lens I look through is undeniable. A vein of vulnerability runs through all of my sculptures and installations, reflecting my questions about being in the world as a creature with human limitations. I am curious about the precariousness of vulnerability and power — how the two closely coexist, even when one might seem to eclipse the other.” Using the vocabulary of abstraction and a spare material language, Kusa’s work investigates how we embody vulnerability and/or power through what we attempt to hold in, what we aim to keep out, and what ties we keep.
With a wide visual range, Kusa’s work takes a variety of physical forms. Of this, she explains, “For several years I have been working in three thematically related — but visually disparate — veins of exploration: abstract bodies that stand in for our own, thread installations about interconnection, and delineations of space where our bodies may or may not belong. Across this broad variety of forms, there are constants to be found: repeated physical gestures, emphasis on the human body, and materials that are themselves vulnerable in some way — that can be crushed, unraveled, or torn. Much of my work comes about through what I think of as three-dimensional drawing, in which a relatively immediate process puts a spotlight on gesture and the material itself.”
Barrier: Keep Out/Stay In (2017), pictured, was Kusa’s first piece that invited a response from a viewer’s own body. Kusa elaborates, “With torn edges and no actual ability to contain, it juts into a room from the wall at an angle, with one end tethered out to appear free-floating. The viewer chooses how to experience the barrier: the smaller-angled side gives the feeling of being penned in, while the opposite side gives the feeling of being outside a limit set for someone else. I continue to push this immersive branch of my work, with questions of connection and disconnection, limits and barriers, at the forefront of my current work. Increasingly, I see my art as a practice of empathy, and this sensibility guides me as I pursue larger, more immersive pieces.”