by Chris Mercerhill
68" x 63"
Upcycled cotton
Dyed with black walnuts
This quilt is made from black and white (and off-black and off-white) upcycled and thrifted fabric, some of which I have dyed with black walnuts that I foraged. The design is inspired by a drawing by an artist named Bustavo, whom I know from Instagram. The plotter drawing looked to me like columns of chunky black magic marker lines and boxes.
I was inspired to analyze the algorithm that was used to create it and then to create my own with parameters based on my own body: the width of the black columns is the width of my hand, the width of the white strips is two of my fingers, the top and bottom of the strips is the arc my arm creates when I reach up and reach down. The abstract algorithm has been interpreted through my own biological being.
After I created this quilt, I wrote code to create a series of drawings called “After After Bustavo,” which are based on the parameters of this quilt. My computer randomly chooses different block shapes, and draws them at random heights within the top and bottom arcs, which are defined algorithmically. Layers and layers of different iterations of these drawings create the final drawings
by Chris Mercerhill
68" x 63"
Upcycled cotton
Dyed with black walnuts
This quilt is made from black and white (and off-black and off-white) upcycled and thrifted fabric, some of which I have dyed with black walnuts that I foraged. The design is inspired by a drawing by an artist named Bustavo, whom I know from Instagram. The plotter drawing looked to me like columns of chunky black magic marker lines and boxes.
I was inspired to analyze the algorithm that was used to create it and then to create my own with parameters based on my own body: the width of the black columns is the width of my hand, the width of the white strips is two of my fingers, the top and bottom of the strips is the arc my arm creates when I reach up and reach down. The abstract algorithm has been interpreted through my own biological being.
After I created this quilt, I wrote code to create a series of drawings called “After After Bustavo,” which are based on the parameters of this quilt. My computer randomly chooses different block shapes, and draws them at random heights within the top and bottom arcs, which are defined algorithmically. Layers and layers of different iterations of these drawings create the final drawings