Fiber Artist Creates Elaborate Silk Windows from Shredded Paintings
In numerous respects, weaving felt instinctive to Élise Peroi. From a young age, the French artist was immersed in the craft, largely due to her mother, a seamstress and sewing instructor.
“I spent considerable time amidst fabric,” Peroi expresses to My Modern Met. “I adored the texture and the possibilities of what this adaptable medium could transform into.”
By the age of 12, Peroi started crafting her own weaving ventures and subsequently received formal education in the field. All those experiences ultimately led to the vast, multidisciplinary approach for which the artist is recognized today. Her creations frequently engage with concepts of emptiness and visibility, intertwining painted fabric, delicate textiles, and semi-transparent panels. Regardless of their dimensions or shapes, these installations reveal the artist’s architectural awareness, constantly altering with the light and inviting observers to delve into the ambiance they create.
“Weaving permits me to form windows, passages, architectures, and spaces to traverse,” the artist shares.
Nevertheless, Peroi warns that her work does not solely center around completion. On the contrary, she posits that the act of weaving itself can be more meditative and philosophical than the end product. This should not be unexpected, given that Peroi’s practice incorporates various media. To construct one of her fiber pieces, she initially paints on silk and then slices it into ribbon-like strands. Following this, she weaves these fine threads, effectively “recomposing the painting,” as she describes. Once finished, she suspends or stretches the weaving within a wooden frame, culminating in layered, highly structured surfaces that demand careful observation.
“Arriving at the weaving phase is already very meditative for me,” Peroi adds. “It is akin to artistic expressions that emphasize the repetition of gestures.”
This connection is exactly why the artist associates weaving with dance in her thoughts. Much like dance, fiber art arises from specific movements, transforming empty space into something interwoven with color, dimension, and physicality. “For me, weaving isn’t merely an artistic expression,” Peroi asserts. “It’s a medium rich with memory and history. I don’t just utilize the medium—I also infuse its philosophy.”
It’s evident that heritage, craftsmanship, and generational storytelling are central to Peroi’s creations, which she recently displayed during this year’s edition of Frieze Los Angeles. At the art fair, she showcased smaller canvases alongside a monumental installation, featuring stacked boxes adorned with delicate threads. The result was mesmerizing, as though the fibers were reeds softly bending to a breeze. This visual perfectly encapsulates Peroi’s own perspective: “It’s an architecture that, through its fluid nature, permits me to interact with the wind.”