Colour Studies of Three Fixed Verse Forms in 11x(19; 39; 65) Diagonal Stitches (a villanelle; a sestina; a canzone)

This series is an attempt to bring such colour studies closer to the artist’s interest in literary texts and their underlying systems. These studies are based on three different fixed verse forms: poems that adhere to structures dictating the number of lines, syllables, and/or stanzas, as well as their rhyme scheme and even metrical arrangements. The villanelle, the sestina, and the canzone, all incidentally European in origin, were selected for having relatively strict rules, which were then used to define the parameters of the embroideries. Each verse form has a set number of lines and stanzas, corresponding with the number of rows embroidered, and each has up to eleven syllables per line, corresponding with the number of stitches in every row. Finally, each has a rhyme scheme comprising four to six end rhymes (in which each line ends in similar-sounding words), determining the number of colours of thread.

This work was shown in the solo exhibition along the lines of—, which ran from 12 to 20 August 2023 at Art Outreach [Singapore].

Photos by Marvin Tang.