Textiles Close Up

This November 16-17, the Textile Society of America (TSA) will convene artists, scholars, and textile enthusiasts from across the country for a two-day program at the Art Institute of Chicago. At the center is On Loss and Absence: Textiles of Mourning and Survival, a landmark exhibition that traces how communities across centuries and cultures have turned to textiles to grieve, remember, and endure.

With more than 100 works spanning antiquity to the present, the exhibition reflects on the ways cloth has carried spiritual beliefs, marked death, honored the departed, and offered repair and resistance. Four thematic currents—Death and Mourning, Transition of Realms, Care and Repair, and Resistance and Survival—guide visitors through the profound roles textiles play in times of transformation and loss. Curators Isaac Facio, Nneka Kai, and Anne Wilson bring together works that speak both to personal stories and to shared cultural practices of resilience.

The program also features a durational gallery performance and artist talk by Nneka Kai, whose practice bridges performance and textile traditions, opening space for audiences to experience the themes of the exhibition in real time. An accompanying conversation with Leslie M. Wilson, Academic Curator and Director of Research Programs at the Art Institute, will deepen the exploration of how mourning and survival continue to shape textile practices today.

The November program marks TSA’s latest installment of Textiles Close Up, an initiative that creates intimate, hands-on learning opportunities around important textile collections, exhibitions, and practices. Past programs have taken participants inside archives and studios across the United States; this Chicago gathering continues that tradition of making space for close engagement and conversation.