Hello, my name is jeanette Gutierrez and I am looking for a space to do an art performance. You can view a video of the performance on Youtube under my name and the title of the video which is Dress Bandage. the following is my artist statement and bio. If you are willing to collaborate on this project please let me know. If you have business near the Fresno Art hop that would be a plus. My Number is 559-305-0255 Please call so we can talk details. -Promotion- building layout-rental fee(if you require one) location (i will perform inside or outside your place of business) and all the rest.

Bio
Jeanette Gutierrez was born in Redwood City California in 1981 and raised in the small, rural, farm town of Dinuba California. Materials and processes used in her work were nurtured through family relationships. Her mother a seamstress, who used crude sketches to describe aspects of her Mexican heritage and culture. Her father a collector of artifacts, an upholsterer and an excellent craftsman inspired the use of fabrics and found materials in her work. Gutierrez received her BFA at California State University Fullerton and is currently perusing an MFA at Asuza Pacific University.

Artist Statement

Selected works from the Bridal Project Series

My current body of work begins with the gathering of dresses and the integration of sewing to produce soft sculpture installation and video/performance. Through deconstructive and constructive processes I generate visual transformations that serve as a catalyst for healing. The Bridal Project is inspired by my explorations of cultural expectations and traditions within the social structure of the institution of marriage, especially as it applies to the personal experience and roles of women.
My concern with the marriage culture began first in 2005 when I assisted my sister by helping her dispose of her wedding dress. In doing so she was able to rid herself of an artifact that for her was a reminder of a verbal and physically abusive relationship to an unfaithful husband.
Recently I was asked to consider marriage by a man I had been in a conflicting relationship for three years. I could not consider matrimony as an option when the plight of so many women hovered over me causing me to have a cynical view of marriage. Still wanting to understand the ritual of matrimony for myself, I began to create a series of works that would be a dialogue of the culture of marriage and the personal struggle suffered by the women who hoped to one day become a bride but were wounded in the process.
Through the participation of dress donors, I gathered wedding dress from women who. In October of 2008 I chose to begin the process of dress gathering through the use of public advertisements. Bridal Staircase functions as the opening line to a vast dialogue concerning marriage. The suspended staircase is composed of a total of seven dresses each with its own moving story, each interconnected, revealing a personal history and an emotional past. Imbedded within each dress is a sheet of tightly gridded wire that is manipulated to look like a staircase suggesting a pathway with no distinct destination or direction that encompasses beauty confusion, and hope. My sister’s need for freedom welled up within me and feelings of empathy for her situation. I knew what it was like to be a slave to your own broken dreams.
Through out my lifetime I have been prone to periods of darkness. Depression seems to be a generational struggle suffered by the women in my family. I have spent years at a time mourning in a state of lost faith, the whole time refusing to get up and walk, much less create. Looking back I realize that my victory was always in direct correlation with my weakness. When I was weak faith was always there to sustain me. I simply couldn’t see clearly because I would lose focus in the darkness. Like a stone, I would begin to sink. I view the bridal project as a pathway to a new season of grace and rest instead of an endless retreat into despair that so many broken hearts find themselves in.
My expectation for the women and for the work is that the work would initiate a transformation and stir a new vision grounded in hope so that the soul of the broken would be set free. It is through the most difficult times that we learn how to recognize the beauty around us in the midst of our brokenness. I believe that we are rescued so that we may rescue others. Through my own times of darkness I was able to identify with these women and do something about it, by making her struggle my own


Location: Fresno
it's NOT ok to contact this poster with services or other commercial interests

• Location: Fresno
• it's NOT ok to contact this poster with services or other commercial interests