“I love the idea that you can truly make a difference with a beautiful and striking visual creation”

Abigail Doan is a fiber and environmental installation artist based in New York City, Sofia (Bulgary) and rural Italy. She has exhibited her art projects with the United Nations Environment Programme and in numerous international gallery and design venues. She is a regular contributor on sustainable fashion and textiles for Eco Fashion World, The Ethical Fashion Forum, Ecouterre.com, Goodlifer, Inhabitat.com, as well as for her own art and fashion blog, Ecco*Eco.

10 Q&A’s for Abigail Doan

1.Why did you become an artist?
My upbringing on a family-operated farm in Hudson Valley was the perfect introduction to my future life as a 'sustainable' artist and writer. I did not become actively engaged in environmental ideas and art until I moved to a city. This new vantage point afforded me the opportunity to carefully examine my studio methods and their long-term effect on my home and the world beyond. Art essentially became a tool for change and greater connection.

2. What was your experience with sustainability in your education?
I did not have formal instruction in sustainable design practices, but I was fortunate to have teachers and advisors who were advocates of environmental outreach and community-based practice. I sincerely think that nature is the best teacher, or at least mentor in conjunction with educational pursuits and hands-on trial and error.

3. What do you like to express with your art/work?
As a geomorphic agent and environmental tinkerer, I want to highlight the fragilities and resilient threads of nature, found in both the open landscape and the domestic sphere. I do this with natural fiber, vegetation, recycled materials, and the loose flotsam and debris of our lives.

4. In which way do you consider your work sustainable?
I write about design, textiles, and fashion as a means of exploring and defining the future of the sustainability movement. I ‘sustain’ myself by practicing what I advocate. I work with materials that express the intention of a project but have the lowest environmental impact and overall production strategy. I buy very few materials, as the majority of my pieces are crafted out of recycled threads, deconstructed garments, vegetational and flotsam textiles.

5. How do you experience working sustainably as an artist?
I find my manner of working to be really dynamic as I have a constant dialogue between how I live and how I make things. I try to find new and improved ways of doing things all of the time, which brings a certain freshness to any routine or method.

6. Where you do find inspiration?
Everywhere. My memories from a childhood spent wandering and daydreaming outdoors. The seeds of a garden and the cracks of the urban sidewalk – inspire me in different, but related ways. I am currently inspired by slow design ideas as well as ancient craft technologies.

7. Who is your favourite artist/designer?
I love the environmental installation work of Agnes Denes as well as the collaborative art team of Newton and Helen Mayer Harrison. My favorite sustainable designers run the gamut from Ekovaruhuset/House of Organic, Meiling Chen, Casey Larkin, Wieteke Opmeer, and Terra Plana to the Permacouture Institute and Slowlab.

8. What do you like best working in art (and fashion)?
I love the versatility of both of these disciplines and the idea that you can truly make a difference with a beautiful and striking visual creation. Sustainable design (fashion) can be as alluring as conventional design, and this is true for really powerful environmental art as well. I see no difference between being an artist and being someone who creates art that strives for a more sustainable (and fashionable) future.

9. How do you think that sustainable fashion/art will develop in the coming years?
I feel that design practices will be enhanced by a waste reduction in the production process. Sourcing may become more sustainable, or at least generated locally (in the same manner that the organic food movement has evolved), and marketing and retailing will follow with a better understanding of what the consumer or user really desires and needs.

10. What would you like to achieve in 10 years?
I hope to have fully renovated our farm in Italy so that I might set up an international study center, exhibition space, and residency program for other artists, designers, and writers. I hope that my work today might lead others along a path where sustainability becomes synonymous with creativity, or rather is integral to making and designing things in general.

Links:

Abigails blog
Abigails pictures op Flickr
Ecco*Eco
Abigail at Greenmuseum

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