CAPE COD ARTS RELIEF FUND
Gin STONE
T
he creative process is never a straight line. It takes twists and turns that sometimes result in reinventing ourselves to become the artist we want to be.
That is the journey that Harwich’s Gin Stone took, switching from painter to a one-of-a-kind mixed-media artist whose work utilizes fiber—longline fishing gear, fabric, dyes, and cyanotypes—to create stunning three-dimensional pieces that include faux taxidermy and myth-based chimeras. She made that leap walking on the beach in Chatham one day while “having painter's block,” she recalls. “I was beachcombing for debris, and I thought the pieces I found would inspire me for colors in my paintings. I was inspired by the actual fibers themselves.” She started experimenting with the fibers on twodimensional surfaces but found the palette limiting. That is when she stumbled upon longline fishing gear “which took to fabric really well,” she says. “I then started putting it on three-dimensional things. … What I do is humane taxidermy. I get longline, hand dye it, and affix it to taxidermy forms the same way a taxidermist would with skin.” Though Stone has only been creating in this medium for roughly a decade, she says, “I’m surprised at how much attention it’s garnered. It’s different. People are attracted to something they haven’t seen before.”
For Stone, it was an important reminder that her work matters. “To have an arts organization recognize you for what you do and to be recognized as an artist, having them see you, I think is the most important part,” she says.
Where she was once unsatisfied with her work as a painter, today she says, “I’m really happy when I finish a piece. … I never got the level of satisfaction with painting that I do with this. Now, when I get bored with a subject, I make my own narrative for it. I make creatures with their own mythology using archaeology, antiquated cultural references, tribal references, and Greek goddesses.”
As a full-time artist, Stone admits, the past few months have been difficult. “It is harder because you don’t know what will happen to your career,” she says. “You’ve been building it and working to get to a certain place and everything shuts down and changes. You don’t know what will be on the other side of it.”
Her unique work was recently recognized by the Arts Foundation of Cape Cod through a mini-grant from the Cape Cod Arts Relief Fund, which supports local artists impacted by the pandemic.
While she is uncertain for what the future holds, she remains hopeful. “I guess the only thing you can do is keep working and hope it comes back or comes back in a better way,” she says.
Pops by the Sea 2020 • At-Home Edition
49
