Rich brocades adorned with labyrinthine beads, flowery bouquets of antique buttons and shimmering bands of sequins, mythical figures and ancient symbols gloriously forged by an unrepentant maximalist: this is what Ken Tisa’s Dream Maps are made of. The eight works exhibited at the Kate Werble Gallery are the first such textile works presented by the artist since the late 1980s. Their return after so many decades hidden from view is perhaps the reason why their Leonine Glare exudes a melancholy aura, but time has also been Tisa’s co-conspirator. From the intricacy of his handwork to the vintage materials he rescues, it takes years to create a Dream Map. Even its name evokes the hours when a mind is attentive only to its numinous depths.
“The space in which we will spend our nocturnal hours has neither perspective nor distance”, wrote the philosopher Gaston Bachelard of dreams. “It is the immediate synthesis of things and of ourselves.” Tisa’s practice, which encompasses painting, collage, ceramics and design, has always intertwined self and things. For his 2017 “Objects/Time/Offerings” exhibition at the Gordon Robichaux Gallery in New York, the artist created a floor-to-ceiling installation of puppets, dolls, masks, ephemera and collectibles drawn from his formidable personal collection. . Throughout the exhibition he hung rows of modestly sized paintings he had made, some of which depicted the very objects on display. The show stunned viewers with the overabundance of it all, the setup brought to life by the fine narrative threads Tisa pulled between particular rooms. Repetition and re-presentation pushed the viewer into deeper examination and reflection, allowing them to discover the fine neural networks that connect Tisa to the world and to art. His Dream Maps guide us differently towards the cosmic, the archetype. In intense pearl Bacchus, 1990-2023, a shadowy figure falls – or hovers – wildly above a sparkling floor. In the Garden of Eden, 1989-2023, the artist reimagines the titular paradise as a grove of eyes above which two serpents dangle the forbidden fruit – represented here by a red bead – at the end of their forked tongues. Another is dotted with brightly colored plastic balls, round and shiny like gumballs, all sewn to the surface of a fun piece of fabric that depicts two deer standing in a deep snowfall. It is a meditative and peaceful scene faithful to the title of the work 2019-23: Heaven.
Glare is a condition that also indicates pain from looking. A dress dripping with sequins under a spotlight, each shimmering with a burning poker in her eyes: you see the wearer, and you don’t see her, you can’t with this kind of interference. This is what gives glamor its gravitas and what gives Tisa’s Dream Maps their thrust and attraction. In an interview about her dear friend and mentor Sara Penn (1927-2020) – a paragon of chic and legendary owner of New York’s Knobkerry boutique – Tisa recalled not being able to make art out of fabric vintage that she had given him. “It was too beautiful and it invaded my visual space,” he explained. Even so, he learned from her that “art could be worn, it could be strong, it could be sewn”. Around the silver skull in the center of Momento Mori, 2020–23, applied white flowers of Tisa, long-lashed eyes and iridescent tears; an earth-colored crown hovers above. If life and love are the most precious of all art forms, then even grief deserves gratitude and deserves a wild celebration like this.
