ARTIST: Lorenza Lattanzi

SKIRT NO: 38.473 

MATERIALS: Wool skirt, cotton fabric, cotton thread 

METHOD: Piecing, quilting, hand-stitching 

ARTIST STATEMENT

“Initially, I was drawn to the bold black-and-white pattern, but when I began working with it, I found it really challenging. Ultimately, I settled on breaking its linear structure and balancing its graphic strength. In a departure from my usual quilting process, I cut, arranged, and pieced the design freely, misaligning yet continuing the woven plaid’s geometry to create a composition that suggests movement, like the swing of the original skirt’s pleats."

ABOUT THE ARTIST

Lorenza Lattanzi (b. 1989, Maine) is a hand quilter, weaver, and textile repairer based in New York. She is self-taught. She states “My practice rises around themes of repair, reuse, ritual, and repetition. I collect and harbor textiles that hold personal meaning or history. Transforming these materials, often destined for discard, I engage in a long history of domestic alchemy, honoring what has been used up, used well, and remade to be used again. Exploring textile labor as an act of care and gesture of love is a way I translate devotion or grief into material form. The physical textile becomes a gift, token, a talisman or charm—something that is functional, holds power, lends comfort, provides rest. Through the physical motion of mending, quilting, or weaving, I access an ordered and peaceful rhythm that synchronizes my mind, body, and spirit. Here, questions emerge: What knowledge resides only in my hands? How do we recognize value? What does it mean to make a home for the soul?”