![\"Michele](\"https:\/\/jasminedirectory.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/cover.jpg\")
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Michele Feder-Nadoff\u2019s work spans a broad territory that includes drawing, painting, sculpture, video, installation, writing and performance. These seemingly diverse works share certain elements, including a preoccupation with surrounding, containing and activating empty space; investigating the way all of the senses combine in the activity of making, and in expanding her practice to involve cooperating and collaborating with diverse communities of makers.<\/span><\/p>\n A seminal experience for Dr. Feder-Nadoff, was her initial trip to Santa Clara del Cobre in Mexico in 1997, where she was accepted as an apprentice by a family<\/a> of traditional coppersmiths. This led to a continuing relationship with that community as she returned year after year to work with and learn from them. This culminated in the publication of a book,\u00a0Ritmo del Fuego\/Rhythm of Fire<\/em>\u00a0and a documentary video\u00a0Huele de Noche<\/em>\u00a0about Santa Clara, its people and culture. This also led her to pursue a doctorate in Anthropology at\u00a0El Colegio de Michoacan<\/em>, which she was awarded in 2017.<\/p>\n In recent years, she has been working on a group of meditative drawings, the\u00a0Chayah<\/em>\u00a0series. These drawings allude to writing, and involve a sort of tunneling across the page, where movement and touch become as important as seeing. The marks she makes gradually become lighter as the brush runs out of paint, then a new line of marks is initiated. The process determines the structure to a certain extent. Intentionality combines with chance in producing the final outcome. She describes this method as like \u201cthe secretions of a snail or the tunneling of a mole:\u201d the \u201cmole theory.\u201d<\/p>\n David Richards:<\/strong>\u00a0You started out as a painter, what prompted you to begin making sculpture?<\/p>\n Michele Feder-Nadoff:<\/strong>\u00a0I had worked in clay when I was younger, so it wasn\u2019t that I was unfamiliar with sculpture. When I was doing paintings at the School of the Art<\/a> Institute of Chicago in the early seventies, my first mature body of work\u2026 mark making to me was always very physical and tangible. It wasn\u2019t just representing an image on the canvas; it was about making something physical, a real thing in real space. The painting was always like an object to me, the surface was very organic, and I was conscious of how light was working on the surface and how things kind of grew. So I was always looking at painting both two-dimensionally and three-dimensionally.<\/p>\n There was a painting in my retrospective called\u00a0Whole Cloth<\/em>, like the expression \u201cyou\u2019re making something up whole cloth.\u201d This was done in the nineteen-eighties when I was showing at Phyllis Kind Gallery. There was a lot of embroidery work and other things attached, coming out of the painting\u2026 these embroidery pieces I had done became 3D when I attached them to the canvas.<\/p>\n DR:<\/strong>\u00a0You went on from there and did some sculptures that were related to those paintings in some way. They were wrapped in fabric and were sort of like tribal fetish objects.<\/p>\n MFN:<\/strong>\u00a0Right, those objects took me into sculpture. I was already doing wrapped pieces that were connected [to the paintings]. I think one of the first pieces that was free standing was called\u00a0Long Life<\/em>. I actually took all these socks that belonged to my husband, back when I was married\u2026 you know how you\u2019re supposed to darn socks if you\u2019re a good wife. I had all these socks that I never darned and I stuffed them with old clothes and darned them together into a long painted and stitched, snake-like form, and called it\u00a0Long Life<\/em>. I wound it up like a huge nest on the floor and I also showed it with one end suspended from the ceiling, as if it was coming out of its coil.<\/p>\n DR:<\/strong>\u00a0Many of your sculptural works seem to be vessels of one sort or another literally or metaphorically, is that accurate?<\/p>\n MFN:<\/strong>\u00a0Right. Even some of my 2D works are related to the idea of vessels.<\/p>\n DR:<\/strong>\u00a0Can you talk about that a bit? What are they containing?<\/p>\n MFN:<\/strong>\u00a0One way to answer that is to say that it\u2019s about lines. One aspect of the drawings that I do\u2026 is more about the containment of nothing. It\u2019s not \u201cnothing\u201d anymore, I\u2019ve drawn a line around it.<\/p>\n DR:<\/strong>\u00a0Containing the nothing\u2026<\/p>\n MFN:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, if you think about the shapes in the drawings\u2026 when I do that loop. It also comes from the basic embroidery stitch or even a knitting stitch and also Arabic and Hebrew [writing]. It condenses a lot of gestures. Most of the time, I\u2019m just wrapping that line around blank paper. The drawing become activated because of the gesture inscribing or going around empty space, and it\u2019s the viewer\u2019s visual perception that makes that blank space\u00a0be<\/em>\u00a0something. The idea of nothing is really not about nothing \u2014 but the edge between something that is there and not there. It \u2018s about capturing light.<\/p>\n In the vessels that are actually like containers, I\u2019m always doing it with the idea that the container is containing a void. Do you remember a series I did that was called\u00a0Darshan<\/em>? I did these castings, hundreds of them. I cast an iron bowl that was cast from a wooden bowl and in there, I cast over a hundred forms in copper, aluminum, bronze, plaster and wax\u2026 and it was the void. That was what that piece was about.<\/p>\n DR:<\/strong>\u00a0In your writing you mention the performative aspect of your work; can you elaborate on that?<\/p>\n MFN:<\/strong>\u00a0I have always been aware of the conceptual aspect, and of the fact that\u00a0how<\/em>\u00a0I was making things was part of the work in a very conscious kind of way. I got frustrated when I was doing work that had a lot of texture and color and everything\u2026 I think part of the reason I stopped doing that [work] is that people couldn\u2019t get past all that. They couldn\u2019t see the conceptual part of it. These paintings would have different ways to represent and use imagery; I was really conscious of the mechanisms that we use to represent or express ourselves\u2026 it was really conscious, it wasn\u2019t just a rush of emotion coming out. So, the performative aspect, for me, is a reflective performative aspect that just became more and more evident the leaner I made my work, and eventually I actually started doing performances.<\/p>\n DR:<\/strong>\u00a0Were you influenced by the writings of John Dewey? I was thinking about his ideas about art as experience and the performance of making things and how the experience of that was his way of connecting art and craft together as part of a sort of continuum.<\/p>\n MFN:<\/strong>\u00a0It\u2019s not about art and craft being a continuum, though I agree with that. It was more about the idea that\u00a0making<\/em>\u00a0something is\u00a0thinking<\/em>\u00a0something. Making it, you\u2019re not just having a gush and things are coming out, that you\u2019re in what they call \u201cthe flow.\u201d It\u2019s that you\u2019re making something that you\u2019re thinking. I was always aware of the performative in the sense that you\u2019re performing<\/a> a tangible act, but the performed tangible act also evokes things, so it\u2019s more than what it is.<\/p>\n DR:<\/strong>\u00a0For a number of years you have apprenticed with traditional coppersmiths in Santa Clara del Cobre in Mexico. How has that experience influenced your work?<\/p>\n MFN:<\/strong>\u00a0Well, the big thing that it did was that when I came back from my first trip [to Mexico] in 1997, I ended up opening up my studio and working with a lot of people in the neighborhood, and many were from immigrant communities. My studio became a community space from 1998 until I left for my Fulbright in 2010. It totally changed my frame of being an artist. Instead of being totally focused on just myself and my own work, I started to think about artistic production as a sort of\u00a0life<\/em>\u00a0production. It revived a social consciousness that I had pretty much given up when I went to art school. I\u2019m still resolving some of the tensions between working by myself and working in communities, and what I want to do with that and how I want to contribute to things.<\/p>\n DR:<\/strong>\u00a0What are your thoughts about cross-cultural influences? I was just thinking about how when working in Mexico you are coming from one culture to another and you\u2019re influencing and being influenced by it\u2026 OK, let me ask you the next question, because maybe that will clarify things.<\/p>\n MFN:<\/strong>\u00a0Can I say something about that though\u2026<\/p>\n DR:<\/strong>\u00a0Sure.<\/p>\n MFN:<\/strong>\u00a0I can tell you that just going to the Art Institute\u00a0was<\/em>\u00a0that for me. I came from a really Orthodox background where you weren\u2019t even supposed to go out with someone who wasn\u2019t Jewish. It was the first time in my life that I was in a secular environment, though I was a rebel and didn\u2019t quite fit in or feel comfortable in the environment I was raised in. I first experienced the whole challenge of dealing with a different cultural environment when I went to SAIC. I think the reason I\u00a0could<\/em>\u00a0come to Mexico was, in part, my own background. The community I work with in Mexico is also a very religious community, a very devout community. They are people of faith; they know what it is to have sacred and non-sacred time. They have a different perspective on things.<\/p>\n DR:<\/strong>\u00a0Well, let me ask you another question, and I\u2019m not trying to sandbag you. Lately there has been a lot of criticism and even hostility directed to what is perceived to be \u201ccultural colonialism.\u201d How does an artist \u201cdo it right,\u201d when interacting with or riffing on another culture? Or, do you feel that this criticism is unwarranted?<\/p>\n MFN:<\/strong>\u00a0No, I think that\u2019s a totally valid criticism, but it also relates to a general thing that\u2019s happening in art. I could have done that when I first went to Santa Clara; I could have come back and done sexy work that was inspired by the indigenous or whatever, but that was never my intention. In the art world there\u2019s more and more of a division between artists<\/a> who make things and artists who have power and want to flaunt their power, who have other people make things for them. I think that going to other cultures to get inspiration, you know, like they say that Picasso went and looked at African masks\u2026 I don\u2019t think there\u2019s anything wrong with people being inspired. I think that what\u2019s wrong is when you take the power, or make money from that, or make people anonymous and steal things from them.<\/p>\n More and more in the art world, the division between [the concept and the making] is part of what makes the work valuable. I think the whole art world is colonial, the whole way it functions. In my work, part of what I\u2019ve been trying to do is to say that there\u2019s a field of makers in this world\u2026 everyone, the tortilla maker, the person who\u2019s making good coffee for you is a maker, everyone is a maker. What does it mean to give people who make things credit and see that they are paid fairly? I mean\u2026 there\u2019s so much injustice. If you think about the visibility and invisibility factors involved and who\u2019s appropriating who\u2026 and so I think that colonialism is not just about being inspired by styles, it\u2019s what you do with that too.<\/p>\n I\u00a0have<\/em>\u00a0been inspired by working in Santa Clara. [When I had] my show in Rockford, I told them that I wanted to have one part of the show dedicated to promoting those artisans. They didn\u2019t want to do it and I had to fight to get them to do it.<\/p>\n DR:<\/strong>\u00a0What is the role of religious thinking and spirituality in your work?<\/p>\n MFN:<\/strong>\u00a0I don\u2019t really feel comfortable talking about that. (Conversation continued off the record.)<\/p>\n In Judaism there is this idea that you do actions in the world and they can be transformative\u2026 I bring a lot of social-political-philosophical thought to what I do. The kind of intensity I have about it \u2013 I\u2019m sure that has to do with my background.<\/p>\n DR:<\/strong>\u00a0Can you talk a bit about your \u201cmole theory\u201d and the importance of body awareness and touch in art making?<\/p>\n MFN:<\/strong>\u00a0Mole theory is a humorous term [I chose] to reference the haptic, the complete sensory perception that makes us move as artists when we make things. It is a phenomena and a dynamic I am still researching in my drawings and [my] anthropological work. It has to do with how gesture and speech, language and making are connected, are a bridge to cognition all merged together. It is a blind seeing through the body.<\/p>\n I first started to realize that when I did an installation in Rockford\u2026 basically one half of the whole space, and I had hundreds of pieces. It was a whole walk-through installation, mostly on the floor. What happened was, as I unwrapped each piece, I followed the mole theory. [Something] inside my body told me where to go and where to put the piece down. We\u2019re talking about a\u00a0huge<\/em>\u00a0amount of space and a\u00a0huge<\/em>\u00a0number of pieces. I can\u2019t remember what my original plan was\u2026 I didn\u2019t follow the original plan and what resulted, I was totally happy with.<\/p>\n It was such an intense experience; I was basically hallucinating by the end. I was supposed to drive home, but ended up staying in a hotel. I was so intense in doing it that my vision was not in reality. I couldn\u2019t see\u2026 I was seeing this other thing. It was this inner thing that was connecting all the perceptions I had; it wasn\u2019t just from my optical sensations.<\/p>\n DR:<\/strong>\u00a0What are you currently working on and where do you think your work is headed in the future?<\/p>\n MFN:<\/strong>\u00a0My practice has evolved to one that is itinerant; it has to be portable. My installations have always been a way to bring the work to completion on a grand scale. Now, it\u2019s like the world is my studio. What I want to do next is work in frescoes, in rooms and spaces [that] I can work in performatively, so that the creation of the work, the cumulative daily practice is accessible to visitors. In the last several years it has been my dream to have a space that I work in and fill but pass on. It either becomes obliterated after being experienced by others or remains, permanent or impermanent.<\/p>\n Working outside on mural size frescoes [also means] making the making of the fresco public. Fresco means many things here in Mexico\u2026 it is political as in many ways [it is] in Chicago and other cities, but I also am interested in fresco as it goes back [to] the first paintings found in caves. [It is] based in the first gestures of expression, or evidence of humans\u2019 need to register their gestures and marks. So this is what I want to work on next, while continuing my daily practice of drawing in notebooks and [on] sheets of paper. It is definitely an itinerant, \u201cambulant\u201d process. I live right now as a turtle with my home being my own body. I am not settled.<\/p>\n Top Image: Michele Feder-Nadoff is an artist and anthropologist who currently resides in Mexico City, Mexico. She received her doctorate in Social Sciences from El Colegio de Michoac\u00e1n, Mexico in 2017. She also holds BFA (1977) and MFA (1979) degrees from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She was a Fulbright Scholar in Mexico in 2010-2011 and has received grants from the Illinois<\/a> Arts Council, the Rockefeller Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts and many others. Her work has been represented by Phyllis Kind, Jan Cicero and Tough galleries<\/a>, and can be found in private and public collections, including the Illinois State Museum, DePaul University Museum of Art, Figge Museum of Art and the Elmhurst Art Museum.<\/p>\n This family studio in Santa Clara del Cobre was founded by Grand Maestro Jesus P\u00e9rez Ornelas (1926-2014) when he became independent of his father don Bernardo Farf\u00e1n who had his own forge-workshop across the street, dedicated to making copper cauldrons. Maestro P\u00e9rez is considered one of the three pillars and \u201cliving legends\u201d of Santa Clara along with his good friends, the artisans Maestro Etelberto Ram\u00edrez Tinoco (1944-1993) and Maestro Feliz Parra Espino (1926-). They were known affectionately as the \u201cthree musketeers.\u201d P\u00e9rez was known for his imaginative extremely detailed copper vessels often taking figurative-shapes, such as his \u201cthree bird\u201d pieces (see illus. above). Since his passing in 2014, the studio has been run by three of his sons: Jaime P\u00e9rez Pamatz, Jos\u00e9 Sagrario P\u00e9rez Pamatz and Napole\u00f3n P\u00e9rez Pamatz (Facebook \u2013 Napoleon Perez). They are known for their distinct styles and for following their father\u2019s tradition of excellence in producing vessels with birds and animals as well as abstract forms and other works.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Michele Feder-Nadoff\u2019s work spans a broad territory that includes drawing, painting, sculpture, video, installation, writing and performance. These seemingly diverse works share certain elements, including a preoccupation with surrounding, containing and activating empty space; investigating the way all of the senses combine in the activity of making, and in expanding her practice to involve cooperating […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":19498,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[71,46],"tags":[744],"class_list":{"0":"post-19497","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-art","8":"category-small-business","9":"tag-art"},"yoast_head":"\n![\"Michele](\"https:\/\/jasminedirectory.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/benjamin1.jpg\")
\u201cBenjamin Notebook, 1,\u201d gouache and sumi ink, from Chayah series, 8.5\u201d x 10.75\u201d, 2017<\/em><\/p>\n![\"Michele](\"https:\/\/jasminedirectory.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/chevron.jpg\"){kind=icon}
Detail, \u201cChevron (Ray),\u201d oil paint on stretched canvas, 40\u201d x 32\u201d, 1976<\/em><\/p>\n![\"Michele](\"https:\/\/jasminedirectory.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/wholecloth.jpg\")
\u201cWhole Cloth,\u201d mixed media on canvas, 60.5\u201d x 60.5\u201d x 6\u201d, 1984<\/em><\/p>\n![\"Michele](\"https:\/\/jasminedirectory.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/secretions.jpg\")
\u201cSecretions,\u201d stoneware, installation view, dimensions variable, 1992-1999, detail of installation \u201cMichele Feder-Nadoff: Between Heaven and Earth (1976-2013)\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n![\"Michele](\"https:\/\/jasminedirectory.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/benjamin2.jpg\")
\u201cBenjamin Notebook 2,\u201d gouache and sumi ink, Chayah series, 8.5\u201d x 10.75\u201d, 2017<\/em><\/p>\n![\"Michele](\"https:\/\/jasminedirectory.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/darshan.jpg\")
\u201cDarshan\u201d (offering), installation view, cast copper, aluminum, bronze, wax and plaster, dimensions variable, circa 1996<\/em><\/p>\n![\"Michele](\"https:\/\/jasminedirectory.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/deepeningthecopper.jpg\")
Deepening the copper tejo, Taller Ziranda, Santa Clara del Cobre, Michoac\u00e1n, M\u00e9xico<\/em><\/p>\n![\"Michele](\"https:\/\/jasminedirectory.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/snake.jpg\")
\u201cSnake Coiled Vessel,\u201c Antonio Ziranda, forged and etched copper, 37 x 40 cm. 1988, collection Museo Nacional de Cobre<\/em><\/p>\n![\"Michele](\"https:\/\/jasminedirectory.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/threebirds.jpg\")
\u201cThree birds,\u201d Maestro Jes\u00fas P\u00e9rez Ornelas, hammered and engraved copper, 1999<\/em><\/p>\n![\"Michele](\"https:\/\/jasminedirectory.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/homagetosantaclara.jpg\")
\u201cHomage to Santa Clara,\u201d installation view, cast bronze, aluminum, copper, plaster and wax; carved wood, 2003<\/em><\/p>\n![\"Michele](\"https:\/\/jasminedirectory.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/regeneationofdeath.jpg\")
\u201cThe Regeneration of Death,\u201d sumi ink, wood, detail of \u201cSoundings\u201d installation, 2011<\/em><\/p>\n![\"Michele](\"https:\/\/jasminedirectory.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/lotusandfloating.jpg\")
\u201cLotus and Floating Lotus.\u201d in installation, \u201cOfrenda a Santa Clara,\u201d hammered and forged copper, table, pine needles, and water. 48\u201d x 48\u201d x 14\u201d, 2011<\/em><\/p>\n![\"Michele](\"https:\/\/jasminedirectory.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/golems.jpg\")
Detail, \u201cGolems,\u201d wax, human hair, mixed media, largest H 73.5\u201d \u2013 smallest 7.5\u201d, 1986<\/em><\/p>\n![\"Michele](\"https:\/\/jasminedirectory.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/chayahdetail.jpg\")
\u201cChayah (mayiim chayiim),\u201d detail of installation \u201cMichele Feder-Nadoff: Without End (ein sof),\u201dBrauer Museum of Art, 2012-2013<\/em><\/p>\n![\"Michele](\"https:\/\/jasminedirectory.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/chayalotus.jpg\")
\u201cChaya \u2013 Lotus,\u201d 23.5\u201d x 15.5\u201d, sumi ink and gouache on Mexican handmade amate (bark) paper, 2017<\/em><\/p>\n![\"Michele](\"https:\/\/jasminedirectory.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/benjamin3.jpg\")
\u201cBenjamin Notebook 3\u201d Chaya series, gouache and sumi ink, 8.5\u201d x 10.75\u201d, 2017<\/em><\/p>\n![\"Michele](\"https:\/\/jasminedirectory.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/michelefedernadoof.jpg\")
Detail of installation, \u201cMichele Feder-Nadoff: Between Heaven and Earth (1976-2013),\u201d hammered copper, stoneware, porcelain, cast bronze, Rockford Art Museum<\/em><\/p>\n![\"Michele](\"https:\/\/jasminedirectory.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/passing.jpg\")
Michele Feder-Nadoff, during the performance of \u201cPassing\u201d with collaborator Kanaan-Kanaan, Western Oregon University, 2012. (Photo Western Oregon<\/a> University).<\/em><\/p>\n
\n\u201cAkko\/ Akka,\u201d sumi ink, gouache, etchings, rubbings, on collaged Japanese papers, 7 x 12 feet, 2012, in installation \u201cBetween Heaven and Earth (1976-2013)<\/em><\/p>\nEl Charon Family Forge and Workshop<\/h3>\n