Today we’d like to introduce you to Jennifer Sargent.
Hi Jennifer, can you start by introducing yourself? We’d love to learn more about how you got to where you are today.
I am a visual artist based in Memphis, Tennessee. I began my artistic career as an undergraduate at Hornsey College of Art in London, England where I studied textiles; it was a thorough education that included art history, drawing, designing, color theory, knitting, and weaving. After college, I went on to gain commercial experience in the textile business as a fabric designer with a number of firms in London. Later in New York City, a fellow Brit and I formed the company, Janice and Jennifer; designing and coloring woven and printed textile collections for mills and retail businesses and producing small collections of handwoven scarves and clothing for department stores and boutiques. In the middle of the NYC bustle, I discovered the slow and ancient process of tapestry weaving. I studied at the renowned Scheuer Tapestry Studio, based then in a loft in central Soho, and worked there with Ruth Scheuer for two years.
Moving on to Phoenix to earn an MFA at Arizona State University I was able to concentrate on my own art-making.
In 2000 I moved to Memphis to teach Fibers at Memphis College of Art and for six years was also Director of Exhibitions and Lectures. As I developed my own work the State of Tennessee provided opportunities and purchase awards along the way. I am the recipient of an Individual Artist Fellowship from the Tennessee Arts Commission, was inducted into the Costume and Textile Institute in Nashville, and was named a Master Artist 2022 for Tennessee Craft.
As you know, we’re big fans of you and your work. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about what you do?
For most of the year my art-making concentrates on handwoven tapestries and drawings but approaching the Holidays I indulge my love of color and pattern by designing and producing a limited line of scarves that are either handwoven or pieced together from fragments of scrapped kimonos.
My artwork is deeply connected to two elements which are always present in the work: a fascination with the narratives that explain the natural and societal worlds (wild or domesticated). The research, if you will, is abstracted and intensified through a personal language of pattern, texture, and color. With this process, I also have the subversive pleasure of working slowly which is as important to me as the finished artwork. Time slows down and concepts and imagery have a greater chance to develop the original vision.
Drawing and tapestry diverge in their methods of creation but for me, both are time intensive. Drawing allows for direct mark-making, erasure, redrawing, and the ability to start at any point of the composition. Woven tapestry, however, requires a rather different approach: starting from one side of the composition, each addition of weft builds on what has gone before. Focus is on the moment and making adjustments to the tapestry as needed to ensure the end product will work because nothing can be changed without requiring a radical undoing and reweaving of the piece. As an artist-weaver, I consider myself simultaneously a contemporary practitioner and part of the longer continuum that is thousands of years old. This idea both challenges and comforts.
Locally I am best known for my scarves because people have the opportunity to view, buy and wear them. More widely in the North American tapestry world where I mostly exhibit I am better known for my intricate tapestries.
These are held in both private and public collections including the Tennessee State Museum, Christian Brothers University, Arrowmont School of Arts and Crafts, The Women’s Foundation for a Greater Memphis, and Wichita Center for the Arts.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://jennifersargent.weebly.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jennifersargentstudio
Image Credits
Peggy Turley, Guillermo Umbria Rumors, Allen Mims, and Chip Pankey
