MADISON, WIS.- To commemorate the Chazen Museum of Art’s 50th anniversary, Toronto-based artist Amanda McCavour has created an installation in Paige Court, the heart of the museum’s original 1970 Elvehjem building. McCavour works with stitched thread to create embroidered installations, and developed this new, large-scale, site-specific work in response to the collection and history of the Chazen Museum and UW–Madison.

McCavour’s work is often described as drawing with thread. By sewing into fabric that dissolves in water, McCavour builds up stitched lines on a temporary surface. When the fabric is dissolved, the thread drawing holds together without a base. The crossing threads possess an unexpected strength that counters the appearance of fragility. To present these thread drawings on a monumental scale, McCavour has printed them on rolls of sheer fabric that hang from the fourth floor and terminate in Paige Court.

During research trips, McCavour visited the botany department, the Helen Louise Allen Textile Collection and the UW Libraries’ Special Collections. She studied native plant specimens held in the Wisconsin State Herbarium and botanical works from the Chazen’s collection. McCavour curated a presentation of the artwork on campus that inspired her planning, alongside her own preparatory drawings, materials and the original thread drawings used to create the sheer fabric panels. Items drawn from the permanent collection include works on paper such as rare watercolors of flowers by Salvador Dalí.

The Elvehjem building opened during a time of national turmoil. McCavour’s installation will challenge the visual weight and dominating presence of the design and travertine marble of the Elvehjem building. The work will offer a transformation of the space and a reflection of the collection, in a celebration of all that has changed, and hasn’t changed, at the Chazen during the museum’s first 50 years.

McCavour holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts from York University, and a Master of Fine Arts in Fibers and Material Studies from Tyler School of Art in Philadelphia, PA. She shows her work nationally and internationally and has received awards and scholarships from the Ontario Crafts Council, The Handweavers and Spinners Guild of America, The Ontario Society of Artists, The Surface Design Association and The Embroiderers Guild of America.