Evelyn Politzer
Bio
Evelyn Politzer, originally from Montevideo, Uruguay, now lives and works in Miami, Florida. After attending Law School in Montevideo, and moving to the United States she pursued her passion for art. Evelyn is a 2020 recipient of the Ellies Creator Award from Oolite Arts Organization and a 2021 MFA in Visual Arts candidate from Miami International University of Art and Design.
Politzer is a fiber artist that communicates through yarn, thread and fabric to create a wide range of pieces from small 2D tapestries to monumental sculptural forms. Through traditional techniques like knitting, crochet and embroidery, she creates objects that are unconventional and seek to spark a conversation on subjects such as place, womanhood and the fragility of the natural environment.
Statement
This body of work began in January of 2021, while researching for my MFA thesis “Artists and their Materials: A Playdate with Tactility in Contemporary Fiber Art.” While most conversations centered around the hardships stemming from COVID, I wanted to enjoy the passing of time through my sense of touch, mainly working with soft, natural fibers, engaging in playful exploration and simply letting the materials guide me through the art making process.
Each piece in my series for the Ciconia Art Collection is a printed detail shot of my large-scale fiber art, which is then intervened upon with thread, hand embroidered one by one. In the three irregular and abstract panels that the image originates from, creativity was let loose without any set expectations. Simply allowing a playdate with colors, materials, movement, shapes, and textures to happen, letting all of these elements move together until the materials had fully expressed their natural direction. The openness of the color scheme is a sign of freedom and liberation in the art making process. The natural yarn is hand-dyed wool, integral not only to my work but to daily life in my native country of Uruguay. While the materials are sourced from leftovers of previous projects, they are given a second life rather than being discarded, a waste I could not bear. Though time-consuming, I am amazed with the limitless possibilities for abstraction with this technique, painting with yarn.
