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Left: Mika Tajima, 2012. Working on project at Material Technology & Logistics, Inc. Photographer Carlos Avendaño Right: Mika Tajima, 2012. Woven acoustic portrait
Left: Mika Tajima, 2012. Working on project at Material Technology & Logistics, Inc. Photographer Carlos Avendaño
Right: Mika Tajima, 2012. Woven acoustic portrait
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Mika Tajima

Mika Tajima, current artist-in-residence, is collaborating with FWM to produce six woven acoustic portraits of local industries in Pennsylvania that engage with old and new technologies. These objects are images of the condition of their own production—the passage of industrial production from physical material to immaterial abstraction is inscribed in its making. Tajima recorded sound with FWM staff at several locations: Edward J. Darby & Son, Inc., Langhorne Carpet Co. Inc., Caledonian Dye Works, Inc., Material Technology & Logistics, Inc., and Philadelphia Technology Park. Orkan Telhan, Assistant Professor of Fine Arts at the University of Pennsylvania, transferred the sound files to black & white image files, which Mika then translated into layered color images on Illustrator and Photoshop in conjunction with FWM staff. The files given to Joy Alaoui, Head Designer at Material Technology & Logistics, developed the woven structure for the images. The final woven designs are displayed as custom acoustic panels.

Funding for this project is provided by National Endowment for the Arts, Carpenter Foundation, Nimoy Foundation, and LLWW Foundation, and the Board of Directors and Members of The Fabric Workshop and Museum.


Bio

American, born 1975 Los Angeles, CA

Mika Tajima received her MFA in 2003 from Columbia University, School of the Arts, New York, NY. After completing her BA (Fine Arts/East Asian Studies) in 1997 from Bryn Mawr College, PA she was accepted into The Fabric Workshop and Museum’s (FWM) Apprentice Training Program as a Post-Graduate Apprentice. In 2011, Tajima was invited to begin an Artist-in-Residence with FWM, 14 years after her original apprenticeship.

Tajima’s extensive exhibition history of solo and group shows includes many prominent national and international venues. In 2012, she exhibited her work at the Seattle Art Museum, WA, in a solo exhibition After the Martini Shot and was represented in the group exhibition Abstract Possible at Tensta Konsthall, Stockholm, Sweden. Other recent solo exhibitions include Pineapples and Pyramids at the Aspen Art Museum, CO (2011); The Double at the Bass Museum, Miami, FL (2010); and The Extras X Initiative, New York, NY (2009). Her collaborative work has been featured in The Pedestrians with Charles Atlas at the South London Gallery, UK (2011); Today is Not a Dress Rehearsal with Charles Atlas and New Humans at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, CA (2009); and the Whitney Biennial (2008). Additionally, Tajima has been profiled since 2011 in New York Close Up, an Art21 documentary film series dedicated to emerging artists in the first decade of their careers who live and work in New York City.