Peter Sowinski

2020

Wood, ink

14" x 14" x 2"

Untitled (Center Diamond, Black & White)

2019

26” x 26” x 5.5”

Wood, Gesso, Ink

Untitled (Center Diamond, Cruciform)

2019

13” x 13” x 1.75”

Wood, Salvaged Workbench Top, Ink

2019

Wood, Gesso

12” x 12” x 1.75”

Untitled (Center Diamond, Green Field)

2019

27” x 27” x 3”

Wood, Plywood, Rip-stop Nylon

2018

Wood, Nylon

16" x 10-3/4" x 1" (Artist’s Frame)

A simple relief carving into a piece of Douglas Fir, abstracting and simplifying the traditional Wild Goose Chase design. Composition set off by a field of green nylon.

2018

Wood

12-1/4" x 12-1/4" x 14" (Artist’s Frame)

A Diamond Square iteration, with organic, asymmetrical carving and an artists frame the affirms the pattern.

2018

Wood, plywood, nylon

40" x 40" x 4"

The materials are salvaged from my employment at a wood shop.  These materials are practical (i.e. inexpensive) but also echo the traditional process of collecting scraps and remnants to make a quilt. 

The quilts I am most interested in are Amish, late 19th and early 20th century, from Lancaster County, PA. They are renowned for the austere beauty, lack of ornament, and rigid symmetry. To me they are outstanding examples of modernist design/art decades before painters would arrive at the same ideas. They also embody a kind of discipline, they represent the entire lifestyle and ethic of the culture that created them. 

This piece, while riffing on a simple quilt design, plays with dimension, textures, space, shadow in ways that a fabric quilt cannot. Exploiting the difference in medium to push the patterns into the new and exciting places is what I'm aiming for in this piece and the other quilt-inspired works.

2017

Wood, salvaged work bench tops, Plastic Shower Curtain, Lights

96" x 96" x 52"

This pattern is inspired by Amish quilt design, and constructed from salvaged materials. The surface is old work workbench tops, richly scarred from use. The circle, which completes the pattern, was carved on site in the gallery debris from the cut was left inside the bounds of the piece.

This piece is my earliest quilt piece, the beginning of an ongoing body of work inspired by late 19th and early 20th century Lancaster County, PA Amish quilts.

2017

Wood

76" x 76" x 14"

2017

Redwood

(variable, in this case ~ 132” x 96” x 96”)

2017

Wood, Shower Curtain, Utility Flags

88" x 60" x 60"

2017

Plastic Cone, Matches

8" x 8" x 9"

2017

Mahogany, Plywood, Plastic, Artificial Turf

14" x 9" x 5"

2017

Wood, Plywood, Oil Stick

40" x 14" x 8"

2017

Plywood, Matches

19" x 11" x 4"

2017

Brush

1" x 7" x 1"

Wood, Pins

1" x 12" x 1"

2016

Materials: Wood, outdoor carpet, foil tape

Dimensions: 36" W x 10" D x 55" H

2016

Materials: Wood, plywood, paint

Dimensions: 80" W x 14" D

2016

Materials: Plywood, wood, gesso, oil stick, India ink

Dimensions: 12" W x 34" H x 28" D

2016

Materials: IKEA table top (LINNMON, white), foam backer rod

Dimensions: 40"H x 33"W x 1.75"D

2016

Materials: Wood, reed, gesso

Dimensions: 15" W x 10" D x 30" H

Materials: Acid brushes

Dimensions: 28" W x 2" H

2016

2016

Materials: Bronze and IKEA bath mat (TOFTBO, turquoise)

Dimensions: 35" W x 24" D x 2" H

2016

Materials: Wood, gesso, shower curtain, foam backer rod, IKEA place mat (PANNÅ, orange, color out of production)

Dimensions: 33" W x 1" D

2016

Materials: IKEA entry mat (TVIS, black, out of production), wood, stain, broom bristles 

Dimensions: 32" W x 36" H x 6" D

2016

Wood, charcoal, chalk

17” x 2-1/2"

2016

Wood, gesso, ink, oil stick, salt crystals

17" x 2-1/2"

The form was first carved, then the surface rendered, and finally submerged in a salt-bath, resulting in the randomized growth of salt crystals across the face of the piece.

2016

Materials: plywood, gesso, stain, broom bristles

Dimensions: 40" W x 6" H

2016

Materials:

Dimensions:

Title: Autonomous

Materials:

Dimensions: Variable

Date:

This piece etc.