carried over, 2025
Cotton organdy fabric, weld dye, logwood dye, hook and eye closures, polyester thread, silk yarn, wire hanger
Carried over draws from stories of Hom’s grandmother sewing pockets inside her coat to carry belongings while leaving home. Hom’s reimagining of the coat utilizes resist dye techniques to reveal the imprint of keys temporarily pressed against each pocket. The ghostly pattern reflects experiences of losing entry, cycles of relocation, and the persistence of finding new openings.
27 x 48 in.
Installation view of works by Kirstyn Hom and Sibyl Rubottom
(a)wake, 2025
Hand painted devoré cotton polyester voile, fiber reactive dye
In her tri-panel installation, a(wake), Hom inscribes the panels with a haiku repeating from top to bottom: “a rupture pulls us awake / a wake rises inside me”. By using devoré, a chemical process that dissolves a layer of mixed fibers, Hom imbues the wavelike script with an incandescent shimmer. The subtractive process of burning away the fabric becomes a form of loss that allows for the possibility of something new. Influenced by Dr. Christina Sharpe’s concept of “wake work” as a framework to actively confront the ongoing impact of the transatlantic slave trade, Hom invites multiple readings of the words “awake” and “a wake” for living alongside grief and finding possibility in the ruptures that surround us.
84 x 41 in.(left, right), 82 ½ x 16 ½ in.(middle)
Installation view of works by Kirstyn Hom and Sibyl Rubottom
wrack line, 2025
Brown and red seaweed eco prints, chestnut bark tannic acid, cotton fabric, cotton batting, polyester thread, raw and habotai silk fabric
wrack line, the quilted floor piece that wraps the margins of the second room, evokes the shifting borders between land and sea. Layers of the quilt are cut away in a reverse appliqué method to form netting that hovers above an interior pattern of eco-printed brown and red seaweeds collected from San Diego beaches. To enter the piece is to be caught and held in an interconnected web that begins fixed to the four walls and softens into a lapping shoreline.
23 in. x 44 ft. 9 in. x 16 in.
Photos by Daniel Lang