Teddy Milder
Passages: ode to jy

Media: archival pigment print on handmade paper; stitched with silk
Size: 12" x 19" x 0"
$600

Artist Statement:
Passages: ode jy, diptych was developed during artist residencies I had in Oaxaca, Mexico in 2016 and 2018. I arrived in 2016 the day after the US Presidential election. Threats of building a border wall loomed large and became the focus of my work. I wandered Oaxacan streets and countryside, photographing and finding comfort and inspiration in both ancient and contemporary Oaxacan walls and art. I began to see “walls” in multiple ways. No longer just a physical barrier, they became conceptual: a state of mind; an element of support, passageways, and shelter; a surface for murals, art, communication and protest.

Inspired by Mexican artist Jorge Yazpik, I photographed and altered two of his metal works. I printed the images on specially coated paper I made at Arte Papel Oaxaca in San Augustin d’Etla. The stitched enhancements and embellishments intertwine my handwork with the image to highlight passageways and symbolically, yet delicately, mend US current border and refugee policies.

Biography

Teddy Milder is a mixed-media artist in Berkeley, California USA. She returned to a full-time art practice 11 years ago after a career as a nurse practitioner & public health policy researcher. She studied at Columbia University in NY & University of CA, San Francisco. She studied photography & fine art digital printing at Berkeley City College; fiber sculpture at College of Marin, where she became an assistant instructor. She took workshops in mixed media, natural dying, paper making & fiber techniques and did two, one-month artist residences in Oaxaca MX in 2016 and 2018. Teddy has served on the Board of Directors of Surface Design Association since 2014. She exhibits widely in the SF Bay area and national & international venues, including three solo shows. Teddy occasionally conducts workshops on digital printing on alternative surfaces, digital techniques for artists and hand papermaking. Her work has been published in the Surface Design Journal in 2014, 2016 and 2019.

http://www.teddymilder.com/