Alyssa Casey - Bay Colors - a collaboration with Rosella Morales Organically dyed wool gauze, 12.5 x 27.5 x 3 ft Commissioned as part of the series, Project°901, presented by 42° arts agency in partnership with Hudson Pacific Properties at 901 Market St., San Francisco. April - July, 2015. Photo: Amanda Kershaw Bay Colors uses a color palette that honors the plant dye resources native to the San Francisco Bay Area. Brilliant yellow, soft pink, and deep indigo are invoked as rays of color beaming down to visually inspire and nourish the passer-by. These soft beams of dyed fabric extend from the lines already found in the architecture of the building, seamlessly and playfully creating a dialogue between the built environment and natural beauty of the Bay. The right window showcases bold stripes of uninterrupted color set equidistant, and slightly askew, so that the pattern of color changes as the viewer walks by. These vertically proud rays of soft cloth in the right hand window balance a net of cloth in the left hand window. Both extend down from and elongate the architectural feature of the gridded window frames above. The twisted and knotted cloth net imagines a sort of DNA of the sun, tracing its way down from the heavens to feed the soil with colored photons of light, bringing life to our natural ecosystem and nourishing the body and soul of the busy San Franciscan starting their foggy workday. What begins as architectural austerity and logic, morphs into a softly wound and twisted net, continually becoming bound up into tighter and tighter knots, until finally just one thread connects it’s heavy weight to the brilliant Bay soil. Rosella and I partnered with San Franciscan organic dyer Monica Paz Soldan to produce the organic colors in the fabric of the installation. Paz Soldan grows many of the plants used in the dying process in her own Mission district backyard. She dedicates her process to combating the global textile industry’s unsustainable practices. (Please see Monica's statement below photos.)

Bay Colors - a collaboration with Rosella Morales

Organically dyed wool gauze, 12.5 x 27.5 x 3 ft

Commissioned as part of the series, Project°901, presented by 42° arts agency in partnership with Hudson Pacific Properties at 901 Market St., San Francisco. April - July, 2015.

Photo: Amanda Kershaw

Bay Colors uses a color palette that honors the plant dye resources native to the San Francisco Bay Area. Brilliant yellow, soft pink, and deep indigo are invoked as rays of color beaming down to visually inspire and nourish the passer-by. These soft beams of dyed fabric extend from the lines already found in the architecture of the building, seamlessly and playfully creating a dialogue between the built environment and natural beauty of the Bay.

The right window showcases bold stripes of uninterrupted color set equidistant, and slightly askew, so that the pattern of color changes as the viewer walks by. These vertically proud rays of soft cloth in the right hand window balance a net of cloth in the left hand window. Both extend down from and elongate the architectural feature of the gridded window frames above. The twisted and knotted cloth net imagines a sort of DNA of the sun, tracing its way down from the heavens to feed the soil with colored photons of light, bringing life to our natural ecosystem and nourishing the body and soul of the busy San Franciscan starting their foggy workday. What begins as architectural austerity and logic, morphs into a softly wound and twisted net, continually becoming bound up into tighter and tighter knots, until finally just one thread connects it’s heavy weight to the brilliant Bay soil.

Rosella and I partnered with San Franciscan organic dyer Monica Paz Soldan to produce the organic colors in the fabric of the installation. Paz Soldan grows many of the plants used in the dying process in her own Mission district backyard. She dedicates her process to combating the global textile industry’s unsustainable practices. (Please see Monica's statement below photos.)

Statement from Monica Paz Soldan:

"I grew up making my own clothes and toys out of the self sufficient tradition of my grandparents, with whom I spent the majority of my childhood. I have always loved being able to create with fiber. Making toys is a pleasure I still make a little time for every year. When I left home and suddenly the majority of environments were mass produced and very little was hand, or homemade, I felt an incredible loss and internal sadness that took me some time to discover it's source. And I soon discovered the more I was in an intimate self created space or nature, the more energy returned to me. My grandfather never had any formal building training and yet he built everything himself on the homestead he created for his family. I was lucky to grow up in such a magical environment. And I am eternally grateful for the awareness it has left with me.

In 1965, 95% of the clothing in an average American’s closet was made in America. Today less than 5% of our clothing is made in the US. Unfortunately, this huge movement of the industry was not done seeking higher standards of production, economic equity for laborers, or tight environmental regulation. It was done to circumvent the policies, unions, and costs associated with doing business ethically and within the growing environmental regulations in the US.

- After agriculture, the textile industry is the #1 polluter of fresh water resources on the planet.

- Recent 2012 report: Textiles are the 3rd largest fresh water polluter in China, ranking above mining and petroleum refinement (53% of the worlds textiles are produced in China).

- Microscopic plastic debris from washing clothing made of synthetic fibers is accumulating in the marine environment. Download a study on this important issue: Microplastic-Study

- According to a recent year-long investigation of the world’s largest dye factories, alkylphenols and PFCs were found in toxic levels in China’s two major fresh water river deltas. These hormone disruptors are hazardous even at very low levels. Both chemicals are man-made substances that persist in the environment and can have potentially devastating effects as they accumulate up the food chain.

- 2,000 synthetic chemicals on the marketplace are used to soften and process clothing after farming and dyeing processes are complete: The synthetic compounds used are attributed to a range of human disease—including chronic illness, auto-immune disfunction and cancer.

- Even the most ‘eco-friendly’ synthetic dyes contain endocrine disrupters and the most commonly used dyes still contain heavy metals—such as cobalt, chrome, copper, and nickel in neurotoxic concentrations.

- Labor is sought for cost first and foremost—not for quality—leading to massive exploitation and many unstable jobs and toxic working conditions.

Living in a nation where the average person consumes 50 times the amount consumed by the majority of the rest of the planetary population it is hard not to see the immorality of not only what but how much is consumed here. If we are unable to stop and take the time to understand the whole nature of how every act of consumption continues to harm the planet and our unity with it's health we have no future as a species. Taking the time to educate and share alternate, sustainable ways is the best use of life for me at this time on our planet."

lysacasey@gmail.com