What counts as damage — and who decides what’s worth repairing? Asheville artist Nava Lubelski is posing these very questions in her mixed-media textile work “Granny Glamour,” now on view in Flora Symbolica at the Asheville Art Museum. On Saturday, June 21, Lubelski will lead an ArtBreak gallery talk, pulling back the curtain on her process of stitching, stuffing, flocking, and distressing vintage floral bed sheets salvaged from a deceased grandmother’s collection. The result? A sly, subversive triptych that grapples with the value of so-called “women’s work,” aging, domesticity, and what the art world tends to dismiss as too frilly, messy, or feminine. “The aesthetic context of the piece is the idea of glamour of the 60s and 70s and reexamining of aesthetics that are marginalized because of associations with elderly women, family environments, and femininity,” the artist says. “The destruction itself is a repair, of sorts, facilitating entrance for these frilly elements into the contemporary art world that values gesture, loose confidence, and the rawness associated with male-dominated art movements.”
ArtBreak: Nava Lubelski is scheduled for Saturday, June 21, 4-5pm at the Asheville Art Museum (2 South Pack Square, Asheville). Free with admission. See ashevilleart.org.