Devorah Sperber

Not surprisingly, I have an app on my homepage that shows me a piece of art from a modern, still-living artist every day.  90% of these artists I find maudlin, depressed, angsty or simply thriving on the shock value of their work.  Somehow many of today's artists lack depth and creativity - even if they possess talent.

But every once in a while an artist comes along an artist that I cling to - a bright, shining glimmer of hope that amazing art is still alive and well.  Today's artist is a perfect example.

Devorah Sperber combines my two greatest loves, hobby category: sewing and art.  She employs spools of thread to re-create highly recognizable works of art through history.  DaVinci, Picasso, Wood, Warhol, Vermeer, Cezanne, Star Trek, Superman.  She uses anywhere from hundreds to tens of thousands of spools of thread for each installment.  And what's more amazing: she's completed more than 50 pieces in the last 12 years.

Now, I have to admit I'm a little torn.  The artist in me is yelling "This is awesome! What a strange and amazing medium!", but the quilter in me is thinking, "Shame, what a waste.  Do you know how many quilts I could make with all that thread?!".  Wow.

Well, without further ado, here's a sampling of her work.  Some of the works below are upside-down due to Ms. Sperber's exploration of optics.  She enjoys the idea that images are flipped upside down inside the human eye.  I highly recommend checking out her site.

The Mona Lisa. 1482 spools of thread.

Warhol, 2,524 spools of thread.

Wood's American Gothic, 4,392 spools of thread.

See the "painting" on the left.  Yep, it's a landscape made of 60,000 thread spools.  Insanity.