Amanda Smith - Studies at the Saint Lawrence River

Photo: Anne-Marie Proulx

Photo: ENE / Jean-Sébastien Veilleux photographe

Photo: Anne-Marie Proulx

Photo: ENE / Jean-Sébastien Veilleux photographe

Photo: Anne-Marie Proulx

Studies at the Saint Lawrence River documents interactions between my pieced textile work, my body, and the conditions of the Saint Lawrence river at Saint-Jean-Port-Joli, Quebec. While in residence at Est-Nord-Est in summer 2019, I visited and swam in the river almost daily. At this point in the river--an estuary's mixture of river and sea, nearly 20 km wide--conditions varied considerably hour to hour. Influenced by tide, wind, and weather, this single body of water behaved as if dozens.

Bringing my textiles into the river was an opportunity to document those changing conditions and their effect on my body, as well as to collapse my inspiration and resulting work into a sort of "collage-in-space." Each textile was created from a mixture of commercially produced fabrics and digitally printed images on cotton of my personal photography of landscapes I have spent time in--Nebraska, Maine, Iceland. Bringing multiple places into the same space, moment, and photograph opens conversation about how we experience and access place physically, visually, and digitally. The pattern and placement of each textile conjure both camouflage and overt ornamentation.

Essay about this series by Emmanuelle Chouquette

Photos from this series are available as 16 x 24 inch prints framed at 21 x 28"