Having degrees in both Textiles and Architecture from Rhode Island School of Design, Latrelle Rostant worked in design for several years before pursuing her MFA in Fiber and Material Studies at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Born in Trinidad and Tobago, Latrelle’s work focuses how she contextualize her cultural identity within a culture that is not her own. Now during the pandemic, Rostant is taking the time to reflect more on herself, her work, and the world.
See more of her work on her website at www.ellertal.com and follow her on Instagram @latrelle_
Close to the Unimagined. One prompts the other, without is the making would not be possible. One then becomes the memory of the assembled parts of the other, no longer present. Photo courtesy of the artist. Image by Alex Younger.
First, and most importantly, how are you doing? How are you navigating the highs and lows?
While being highly aware of what’s happening, I have to be selective in the type of media I consume. It’s so easy to be overwhelmed but I try to navigate it all, taking it one day at a time.
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?
I do prefer to work in my studio alone. The isolation that I seek in my studio is about self and the desire to make uninterrupted. In order to materialize the ideas, this isolation allows for the mediation on the work and process of making. The isolation that is happening now is different, this isolation is for the benefit of the communities we live in, it’s necessary to save lives.
Modular Loom 2/20/19. Unique loom developed, designed, made and assembled by artist. Photo courtesy of the artist.
Can you could briefly talk us through your practice?
Working in fiber, my work explores what it means to be too foreign for the place considered home and the spaces I now occupy. The carnival culture of Trinidad and Tobago, where I was born, has become a space where the culture of those who were bought or came, created a third place for the new culture they became a part of. Each culture taking its own culture and adapting it to what they encountered when they arrived on the islands. Taking the prompt of adaptation, I have adapted the loom to make objects, that like me, do not inherently reflect how they were constructed. The modular loom I created, allows me to make woven objects that not only respond to how they are warped on it. But they also respond to what I see as I am weaving on the modular loom. Looking at and understanding how tools, technique, space, and material can be used to make objects that cause me to reflect on my own understanding of self. A third-place that is the intersection of the place that I came from and the places that I now occupy.
Modular Loom 2/20/19. Unique loom developed, designed, made and assembled by artist. Photo courtesy of the artist.
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?
What is happening now is being processed in so many ways, personally I am contextualizing all this in relation to history, mass media and the desire, of some, to go back to how things where. But I wonder how does one go back, when so many have died and we haven’t been given space to grieve? I personally would not use coronavirus imagery in any work I produce because I would not want to trigger unprocessed trauma in the viewer. But I may be projecting.
Are you thinking differently? Coping differently? Inspired differently?
I would like to think that all this is expanding the ways I am looking at the things that interest me. Like how all this will affect how culture is expressed in shared open spaces. What does it mean when we cannot gather physically for cultural celebrations? How are these moments transformed? What is the next iteration of these celebrations? I don’t know if that answers the question but it what I’m starting to think about.
Woven Object. Woven archive from a modular loom iteration that no longer exist. Photo courtesy of the artist. Image by Alex Younger.
Modular Loom. (Side view). Unique loom developed, designed, made and assembled by artist. Photo courtesy of the artist. Image by Alex Younger.
What do you think or hope will be different after this crisis has passed?
I don’t know what to expect, but I hope for some sort of change. More compassion. I really don’t know, I feel I have been experiencing every thing on survival mode, the pandemic and everything that came before. All I can do is acknowledge when I feel overwhelm, but I cannot give up hope, I cannot give up hope on my community and the country that I live in.
What is bringing you solace, or even joy, in this moment?
Now is the time for me to be self-introspective and take a pause. I’ve allowed myself to be ok with not making at the pace I was previously. For me when it comes to art and art making, so much time is spent reading, observing and processing everything. All that and more before I even start to tackle what I’m going to make. Now is a time to reflect on so much, I may never have this type of pause again, but I am very aware that I’m both using my time wisely and squandering it.
Same Place. Fabric Collage. Photo courtesy of the artist. Image by Alex Younger.
What research or writing are you doing that you find compelling?
The following are some of the authors that have produced workings that has helped me focus my thoughts on the what drives why I make. Stuart Hall, Kobena Mercer, Lorraine O’Grady, Paul Gilroy, Frantz Fanon, Toni Morrison and others.
Modular Loom. Unique loom developed, designed, made and assembled by artist. Photo courtesy of the artist. Image by Alex Younger.
Are you reading anything at the moment?
I am reading several books off and on right now, they are:
The Source of Self-Regard by Toni Morrison
What Color is the Sacred by Michael Taussig
We Wanted a Revolution Black Radical Women 1965 - 85: A Sourcebook
On Weaving by Anni Albers
South of Pico: African American Artist in Los Angeles in the 1960’s and 1070’s by Kellie Jones
The Transit of Empire: Indigenous Critiques of Colonialism by Jodi A. Byrd
Patterns in Circulation: Cloth,Gender and Materiality in West Africa by Nina Sylvanus
Chromophobia by David Batchelor