Details
In a society that systemically undervalues caretaking and shortens the time allowed for care and grief, I look to the night sky in search of more generous measures of time. Working with pulped fabrics, I seek to foreground transformative human experiences and the often invisible layers of care that sustain them. — Julia Goodman
Bay Area–based artist Julia Goodman creates hand-formed paper sculptures from reused textiles, expanding the possibilities of handmade paper through a focus on sustainability, texture, and history. Drawing on the overlooked tradition of gathering rags for papermaking, she collects cotton bedding and t-shirts from family, friends, and thrift stores. These materials—embedded with traces of everyday life—bring forward the unseen labor of women and caretakers, past and present. Goodman tears and pulps the fabrics, forming and pressing them into shapes and textures that recall the moon, the imprint of her gripped hand, and the folds of bedsheets and t-shirts. Colors emerge directly from the original fabrics or by mixing together differently-colored fabrics—without dyes or pigments. In recent work, washes of watercolor respond to layered shapes and surfaces in her work.
For her exhibition at SLOMA, Goodman offers tactile, alternative ways to experience time. The wrapped sculpture An Unimaginable Unit of Time, begun in March 2020, marks the personal and collective passing of days during the pandemic. Each day, she formed an imprint of her grip in pulp along strips of torn bedsheets, resulting in a continuous line that ultimately stretched 0.95 miles. In Waning and Waxing, Goodman carves moon phases into large textured calendars, recording the eleven months she mourned her father and, years later, the nine and a half months of her pregnancy. Through handmade materials and labor-intensive rituals, Goodman’s work holds space for cycles of love and loss, connecting us to the rhythms of time.
About the Artist
Julia Goodman works at the intersection of papermaking, textiles, sculpture, and painting. Her work is held in the collections of the National Museum of Women in the Arts, DePaul Art Museum, Recology San Francisco, and Google. Unimaginable Units of Time marks her first solo museum exhibition at the San Luis Obispo Museum of Art. Recent group exhibitions include the National Museum of Women in the Arts, Contemporary Jewish Museum, San Jose Museum of Art, DePaul Art Museum, Poetry Foundation, and the Berkeley Art Center. She was selected for the 2020 Women to Watch Award by the San Francisco Advocacy for the National Museum of Women in the Arts. Goodman earned an MFA from California College of the Arts and a BA in International Relations and Peace & Justice Studies from Tufts University. She teaches papermaking at CCA and leads workshops throughout the Bay Area, including at the Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive, Exploratorium, and NIAD. She lives in the Bay Area with artist Michael Hall and their family.
Related Programming
Friday, Sept 5 at 5 PM: Join artist Julia Goodman and SLOMA’s Chief Curator, Emma Saperstein, for a guided tour of the exhibition. Free and open to the public. Presented in partnership with SLO County Arts’ Art After Dark program.
Saturday, Sept 13, 11 AM–1 PM: SLOMA’s Second Saturdays free family art-making event. Kids and kids at heart can complete a handmade paper collage inspired by Julia Goodman’s exhibition. Free and open to the public.
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