Carol Zou

Visual Art – Santa Monica

i am interested in the idea of place and the stories we tell about place. i am also interested in art's potential to change our perceptions of the space around us, whether it be the immediate surroundings or the world at large. with this in mind, i set out to create work that elucidates a history of a certain place, and in doing so, transforms our perceptions of it. i began working with the idea of place and narrative through photography and animation, but eventually switched to sculpture. i settled on working with textiles for their inherent storytelling ability. the textile industry is fraught with stories - the story of the person who labored to create the textile, and the story of the person who consumed it and cherished it. additionally, images woven into the fabric have been used throughout history as a narrative device, and in native american mythology, storytelling begins with the spider woman who wove the world out of light. fabric and thread are what we choose to wear closest to our own skin. they are the houses of our body, and through the dictates of fashion, the houses of our identities. they move with us - something our homes are increasingly doing in a transnational world.