Lee Davignon (She/They) is a textile and installation artist living and working in Seattle, WA. They earned their BFA from the Massachusetts College of Art and Design in 2013. Their work has been shown at the Fuller Craft Museum, SAM ReMix, Spring Break, Common AREA Gallery, Shunpike Storefronts, The Factory, and the Klondike National Historical Park.
For more information, please see: Lee Davignon and on Instagram @supposed_lee.
Lee Davignon, Labor Movement, 2020. Work pants (cotton twill), red pants (cotton twill), thread. Image courtesy of the artist.
First, and most importantly, how are you doing? How are you navigating the highs and lows?
Hi I’m honored to be here, digitally. I’ve been coping, some days better than others, but I am healthy in body and mind. I was supposed to start a residency April 1 at Recology Cleanscapes, a recycling center here in Seattle, and have been readjusting my expectations for the scale of work I can make now. I’ve been able to set up a haphazard home studio and have been working in fits and starts, in between the panic and anxiety and navigating this whole thing. My loom is set up in the basement but it’s too cold and kind of damp, so not ideal to work so I’m not pressing too much. Overall I’m just trying to be gentle and patient with myself and others, go outside every day, and help where I can.
It's my experience that most artists engage with some level of self-isolation in their day to day art practice. Has this been your experience? And if so, have you found these innate rhythms to be helpful during this larger, world-wide experience of isolation?
Funnily enough, I have always worked in shared community spaces up until this summer when I did a residency at Vermont Studio Center. That was the first time I had a private studio (with a Door!), and I found it really suits my practice. I have a tendency to self-isolate when I am working a lot in my studio, and being in community with other artists at my old studio, Common AREA Maintenance, was a great way to counter that. I’m slowly finding the work from home rhythm, and although the space (shared with housemates) is not the best for my work it is not the worst. I’m a fan of restrictions to direct the lens of my making, and the space to think, write, and revisit old work has been a silver lining.
Lee Davignon, Labor Movement, 2020. Work pants (cotton twill), red pants (cotton twill), thread. Image courtesy of the artist.
It would be great if you could briefly talk us through your practice. Understanding it is integral to appreciating the multivalence of your work.
I am a multi-disciplinary artist based in Seattle. I come from a craft background, and have been working with textiles since I was very young. I am an indiscriminate materialist, and am most interested in using non-traditional art materials from the waste stream- trash, old clothes, mill ends, dog hair, etc.
My sculptural and installation work is informed by my textile practice, and my installations have been moving into performative territory as I lean in to addressing the intersection of the body with labor, object, and value. There is a call and response that happens working across so many processes, and I try to stay loose enough to let information filter through- really trust the process, push the materials, and let my hands do their thing.
I have been in quarantine since March 3, and my practice has begun to fill the new spaces in oddly holistic ways.
Has any of your imagery shifted in a reflection to what's currently happening? Or are you considering using coronavirus related imagery for future projects? Do you find it necessary to make work about the pandemic? And why, or why not?
I have become really interested in telephone poles/ power lines lately, maybe because I have been walking so much. I’ve been thinking about themes of connection, community, aid, and privilege. I’m not working purposefully toward making work about the pandemic, but it’s filtering in. I have been revisiting some older text-centric pieces from 2016-17 and will be making more banners in the coming months…I feel that although I often work in abstract ways, some things need to be stated clearly. And banners are easy to make and store at home. I have been collecting words from the news to use with those, so that’s maybe the most direct thing at the moment.
Lee Davignon, Labor Movement, 2020. Work pants (cotton twill), red pants (cotton twill), thread. Image courtesy of the artist.
Are you thinking differently? Coping differently? Inspired differently?
I’m coping by taking a lot of dance breaks. I use the hours I would have spent commuting to stretch, dance, and explore movement, which has been inspirational in itself. My body has been the most available, immediate medium, able to express and process simultaneously- I’ve been taking a lot of comfort in that, and learning from it. Training for something, almost. I have also been watching a lot of ASMR videos. I think because I struggle with PTSD the highs and lows aren’t so jarring for me- it’s certainly not easy, but I feel somehow equipped for the uncertainty and stress of the current moment.
What do you think or hope will be different after this crisis has passed?
This crisis is highlighting the insecurity and inequality that so many people have been experiencing in this country already. Things cannot go back to the way they were or stay the way they are. Mutual aid is more important than ever, and I hope that we can keep these habits of caring for ourselves and checking in with others. Politically, I am raging. Why does it take a pandemic to house the houseless? Why are most of the gig workers I know making more on unemployment than they did when they were exhausted from working five different jobs and hardly making ends meet? Why would we go back to that? Honestly, hope is not enough- we need to fight for the change and raise up the voices of the most disenfranchised. Silence=Death in so many ways.
Lee Davignon, Sincerely, The Management’ I (In the Wake of…), 2019. Installed at Common AREA Maintenance, Seattle, WA, 2019. Cotton, thread. Image courtesy of the artist.
What is bringing you solace, or even joy, in this moment?
Movement, living near a vegetable stand, spring coming regardless, spending more time with my partner, making secret very bad art, connecting with faraway friends, and working on my truck.
What research or writing are you doing that you find compelling?
I’m always journaling, and I’ve been looking back on those books a lot. It’s a good time reflect.
What are you reading?
The news. A lot of poetry- things I can chew on and carry with me - a lot of Louise Glück this week. I also just finished ‘Leatherfolk’, a great essay collection about radical sexuality. I picked up Ben Davis’s '9.5 Theses on Art and Class’ but haven’t gotten far yet.
Lee Davignon, Sincerely, The Management’ II (Please Don’t Concern…), 2019. Cotton, thread. Image courtesy of the artist.