Tjitske Storm, Curious Caterpillar, NL, 2024

Renowned contemporary fiber artist Tjitske Storm is celebrated for her captivating tapestries that delve into the natural world while seamlessly merging age-old craftsmanship with modern technology. Storm’s art embodies the convergence of contrasting realms, where the fluid elegance of organic forms intersects with meticulously crafted geometric compositions. Her creative journey commences with high-resolution photography and culminates in vivid digital collages that achieve a graceful equilibrium between recognizable components and intricate abstract structures. By integrating digital techniques into her work, Storm revitalizes the ancient art of tactile craftsmanship, firmly situating it within the contemporary landscape. Her pieces illuminate the interplay between diverse species, juxtaposing the digital and the tactile, abstract and detailed elements, and geometric and organic aspects. Through her exploration and harmonization of these contradictions and perspectives, both conceptually and visually, Storm aspires to “re-wild the world,” essentially aiming to re-establish humanity’s connection with the natural world.

Human Nature, her latest endeavor, is an ongoing series inspired by the all-encompassing force of evolution and its emotional reciprocity. Woven stories wherein the rich natural world fluently intertwines with complex human behaviour. Born from her fascination for psychological and societal patterns, Tjitske explores the mythological roots of these behaviors within nature itself. A search for acceptable explanations for the mostly chaotic path as it happens. Abundant celebrations of blossoming beauty comprise contrasting realms while translating the fragility of life. The desired transition of current times is firmly accentuated by shifting toxicity towards compassion, ego towards us, darkness towards light and fear towards love. In all of this, we are only human nature.

Each work is precisely balanced in compositions, color and shape. The implementation of graphic weaving techniques in the overall organic flow of natural images add subtle shifts of perspective while underlining the unity and diversity of life. Tjitske collected and selected more than 300 images per artwork. She cut-out, re-colored, adjusted and merged various elements of these images to create the blossoming compositions. Thereafter she translated these complex multi-layered digital artworks to Jacquard-fabric by implementing various weaving techniques while keeping in mind the Jacquard weaving method built up from eight colors only.

The yarns used are from (Mercerized) Cotton and NewLife® Polyester and all is made within a sustainable textile production in The North of Europe.

60h x 62w x 1d in
152.40h x 157.48w x 2.54d cm