Virtual Gallery
Virtual Gallery
Dawn Waters
I create paintless paintings. Think sugar coated bundles of detail and slight oddness combined to make unpainted paintings that are arresting and uncanny.
In 2014, a friend taught me the basics of wet felting and I began making wearables. Soon after, I was introduced to the felting needle. I wondered if I could make a fiber portrait with one of these barbed needles. Needle felting is like tattooing, but with wool. I kept at it, and finally the likenesses were recognizable and the intended emotions emerged.
I relish the challenge of bringing a subject to life through fiber and creating work that begs to be touched.
Artist Statement about the Piece (s) Submitted
Title/Medium: This one goes out to the one I love (Michael Stipe) [fiber on painted background. Needle felted with wool. No paint on face.]
"In 2014, Michael Stipe, rock band REM frontman, said about coming out as queer, “These 20 years helped develop the clarity of my voice and establish who I would be as an adult.” Stipe has long been an idol of mine, particularly impressing me with this clarity of voice, authenticity, vulnerability, and ability to connect. My goal in this portrait was not simply to create his face, but to include many of his poignant lyrics that have touched my heart over the years so that the piece would connect to others who feel as I do."
Artist Bio
Dawn came to create art relatively late in life, after an advertising career and working as communications director at Virginia Commonwealth University School of the Arts. She is self taught and resides in Gulfport, Florida.
Since she began making fiber paintings in 2017, Dawn has been honored to receive the first place award in Florida CraftArt’s 2021 Members’ Show and in Fearless Fiber at Carrollwood Cultural Center, Tampa FL, as well as four awards of distinction. She served as juror for Felt: Fiber Transformed 2020, Fiber Art Network, and has had her work featured in Outsider Art Magazine and on the Summer 2019 cover of Fiber Art Now. Her work has hung in galleries across the U.S.
This one goes out to the one I love (Michael Stipe)
Dawn Waters
2022, fiber on painted background. (Needle felted with wool. No paint on face)
30"x24"
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