Lithuanian-born Severija Incirauskaite is one of those artists that makes people appreciate creativity and innovation. This talented textile artist embroiders ordinary objects like pails and spoons, transforming them from cheap metal into multi-faceted, mixed-media artwork. While Incirauskaite?s methods are fairly traditional?most of our grandparents were cross-stitching before this woman was born?the finished product is anything but ordinary.
Incirauskaite gets much of her inspiration from everyday life, including various traditional references to her Lithuanian heritage. Each nostalgic piece reflects the intersection of two different worlds: pop culture and Lithuanian history; the urban and rural; the soft feminine and the rough metallic. For one project, Incirauskaite embroidered cars and car parts. Here, she explored our ?war on the road,? referencing the many flowers we see marking graves on street sides.
To create each cross-stitch metal art piece, Incirauskaite pulls mass cross-stitch patterns from women?s hobby magazines. She then drills holes in the metal and uses cotton thread that can adapt to the object, making the metal object as much of the focus as the thread. The opposing yet complementary nature of the two materials is most visible in Incirauskaite?s cross-stitch metal kitchen objects. A frying pan with cross-stitched eggs and a shallow, metal plate covered in cross-stitched fruit show how thread and metal work together.
While Severija Incirauskaite?s cross-stitch metal artwork may be some of her most intriguing work to date, this specific art form hasn?t limited the artist. Incirauskaite studied textiles for more than five years, and has since been employed as a professor at the Vilnius Academy of Fine Arts. Her work?both the cross-stitch metal pieces and other projects?has been successfully exhibited all over the world.
