Response to Katie Lewis' Presentation

There were plenty of things I liked about Katie Lewis’ work. I liked the way she made patterns of thread resemble musculature. I liked her use of color to give her work an organic quality. And particularly, I liked the way she created gradation in her work simply by varying the concentration of pins and/or thread throughout the piece.
Nevertheless, her presentation left me feeling a little bereft. She made it clear that nearly every piece was linked to some perception she had within her own body, but she failed to tell us what that perception was. I understand that privacy is important when somebody is talking about their body, but if the artist was aiming for privacy, I can’t see why she would base all of her artwork on a private matter. Similarly I understand that comprehension of the sensation itself might not have been important to the understanding of the art, but if this is true, then why did she emphasize it so much. In the end, I just couldn’t help but feel like somebody had said, “I have a secret for you, but I’m not going to tell you what it is”.
Still, I want to make it clear that I appreciate the fact that Lewis’ artwork does bear some grounding in the real, rational world. Even if that grounding is something that I’m not able to fully understand for some reason, it still produces some pretty cool artwork.