Sam Gilliam: Sewing Fields

Dedicated to Gilliam's late-career sewn and collaged fabric works, this colorful catalog embraces the artist's restless creativity and visionary approach to abstraction

A pioneering artist who redefined the boundaries of painting, Sam Gilliam (1933-2022) transformed the medium with his radical approach to color, material and space. Sewing Fields focuses on a lesser-known yet crucial period in Gilliam's later career: that of his sewn and collaged works. His residency at the Ballinglen Arts Foundation in 1993 reshaped his artistic practice. Far from his Washington, DC, studio, Gilliam embraced new materials, working with pre-stained fabrics that he shipped to Ireland, cutting and layering them into sculptural compositions. A collaboration with a local dressmaker further expanded his process, reinforcing his innovative fusion of painting and textile techniques. Sewing Fields brings these groundbreaking works back to the Irish Museum of Modern Art, nearly 50 years after Gilliam's first Dublin exhibition, positioning him within a broader transatlantic dialogue on abstraction.