Textile Artist to Watch Now: Patrizia Ferreira

Go see textile artist Patrizia Ferreira's solo exhibit at Diamonte Arts and Cultural Center on view until Friday, May 19.

I create visual utopias full of exotic plants, flowers, exuberant foliage, and exotic peoples, in an effort at transporting myself to an invented place. A place where memories exist, a place of legends and allegories. My pieces are vibrant yet nostalgic, full of longing for a place that does not exist anymore anywhere but in my imagination. I yearn for my land, my roots yet, I am aware the place I miss does not exist, anywhere but in my memory.

- Patrizia Ferreira

Drop everything you are doing and head directly to Diamonte Arts and Cultural Center (DACC) in Raleigh, NC. You will find the most refreshing exhibit I have seen in a long time - a solo exhibit curated by artist Peter Marin and works by textile artist and educator Patrizia Ferreira. This exhibit titled En Busca del Paraíso Perdido (In Search of the Lost Paradise), April 15 to May 19, 2023, showcases Ferreira's latest body of work made during her time as the first artist in residence at DACC.

This body of textile pieces focuses on the loss of the environment and our relationship to the land. Ferreira painstakingly by hand weaves discarded materials like fabric remnants, single-use plastics, and foraged natural elements like shells together to create vibrant textile works. Every part is carefully woven into one another, creating a layered surface that captivates the eye. Her attention to detail and the intricacy of the design make it clear that each piece is an actual labor of love and takes weeks for Ferreira to create. 

Her piece, Encaje de Fósiles Encontrados (Lace of Found Fossils), 2023, is made out of debris found on the beaches of her home country, Uruguay. Repurposed and heirloom textiles are woven with plastic bits, fishing lines in various colors, and shells in a lace-like structure. The use of heirloom textiles represents the fragility of our shores and environment. Threads gently dangle from the bottom of the work, echoing this fragility. 

Nuestros Ancestros (Our Ancestors), 2023, a repurposed heirloom garment is suspended in the air. A garment passed down for generations carries the voices of the women that came before us. Voices speak of life, death, struggle, persistence, and eternity. 

Infinite, 2023, is a collaborative work in which the viewer is invited to add their own natural and man-made debris to this work that acts as a bridge between the two worlds, Earth and Water. The work does not have a beginning nor an end, making this ever-changing work a metaphor for life, our planet, and us.

View more of her work on her website and Instagram. Patrizia Ferreira received a bachelor's degree in textile design from the Institute of Industrial Design in Montevideo, Uruguay, and a Master of Science in textile design for prints from Philadelphia University (now Thomas Jefferson University). She is an artist and educator working in Raleigh, North Carolina.