Subversive, Skilled, Sublime: Fiber Art by Women

Adela Akers

Adela Akers grew up by the sea in Havana, Cuba. She developed this interactive woven structure to set into motion the choreography of color, light, and shadow across a seascape over time. When By the Sea is viewed from the right, the grey glow of morning light radiates across the deep turquoise water and the mountain peaks of a distant island. When viewed from the left, an evening sky absorbs much of the light, except the faint glow of the headland and its reflection on the inky sea surface. As you walk from one end to another, only the purple horizon line remains constant. Each of the thirty-two panels was individually woven in Akers’s signature dense style—a rigid sisal warp (the vertical threads) and tightly pulled wool wefts (the horizontal threads)—and sewn together into the accordion form.