Fractal Realities: A Look at Lala Abaddon's Amazing Photo-Weavings
originally published on ArtSlant on February 24, 2015
Mixing painting and weaving with 35mm photography, Brooklyn-based artist Lala Abaddon creates intricate woven works that “create space and time within a stationary moment” through her use of color and contrast. By cutting printed photographs into hundreds of strips, which she then weaves together, Abaddon creates a deconstructed collage of worldly experience, exemplifying alternate realities of chaos, color, and the universe. Her work dives into the cerebral components of human connection within the world, reiterating her play with interrelation and the interconnecting webs of reality. "There is a web that connects all beings and energies and transcends all conceived boundaries of time and space."
While she attempted collegiate training, Abaddon found that she already had the tools she needed to realize her work. Her mission going forward as an artist was clear: to envision alternate worlds and manifest those inner complexities in still artworks. Her work represents her ideas about existence and the constructs of one’s mind within, and in relation to, reality. Working across several mediums—from poetry to photography—Abaddon found herself weaving her sliced ideas back together. As she continued to analyze her initial weavings, she found that this process of de- and re-construction allowed her thoughts on space and time to collide physically within her practice.
Her upcoming show, Fractal Realities, continues to play with the metaphysical ideas she has considered throughout her career. The patterns she uses have specific metaphorical significance within her continued research, allowing for each of her weavings to better combine and present notions of human connection through its physical interconnection. Transported elements of time and space from the present, past, and future, speak to the interconnectivity of the universe and bind themselves together within the basket-weaves of her work. In addition to her elaborate weavings, Abaddon has also created a site-specific installation at Castor Gallery, which will illustrate webs of her experiences, memories, reflections, and the space between various realities.
On the occasion of her upcoming exhibition, the artist and Castor Gallery shared with ArtSlant photographs of Abaddon’s studio, process, and most recent work.
Abaddon’s Fractal Realities, featuring new site-specific works, opens Thursday, February 26th at Castor Gallery, 254 Broome Street, on the Lower East Side. The opening reception will be from 6–9pm, and the exhibition runs through March 29.
Please note that the images below are some of the images that were shown with the article. To see all of the photographs included, please refer to the article on ArtSlant.
