i wish i had made this....

Anni Albers, City, 1949
Linen and cotton pictorial weaving. JAAF: 2003.12.1
44.45 x 67.3 cm (17.5 x 26.5 inches)
©2007 The Josef and Anni Albers Foundation / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

The piece I wish I had created is city by Anni Albers. I enjoy the restricted colour palette and layout.  The image also gives the impression of a busy city, perhaps reflecting on water. This reminds me of my own city of Manchester, with its tall buildings and canal network. The spatial qualities of the image are very effective and aesthetically pleasing to the eye. The main pictorial element of the piece is centered within a white weaved border; this gives the feeling of looking out of a window.

Anni Albers used weaving in an inspired way, in contrast to her contemporary's, who mainly constructed pattern-based designs. Albers moved away from the traditional ideas of weaving and used the threads in almost a painting fashion. This technique gave her work more depth and visual concept to the viewer of actually looking at an image, for example the image below, could be considered more fine art than textiles. This piece in particular features uneven edges, this adds to its handmade quality and gives the viewer a more tactile experience of wanting to actually touch the work.

Anni Albers used a restricted palette in all her work. Often featuring browns, greys and earthy colours. She used blocks of colours in an intelligent way, evenly spacing them throughout the piece, creating solid structures and shading to create a sense of depth. The use of colour in the top third of the central image has been vastly muted in comparison with the rest of the central image. This gives the illusion of the suns reflection at the top of the image in a busy city environment. The barren border around the piece enhances the overcrowded feel of the central image.

Weaving is an ancient craft and has roots all over the world. Different cultures use different colours to represent stories and tales in a visual manner. The weave in this image of the city, is quite a loose weave, meaning that the piece would be quite delicate to handle and therefore would be used as a wall adornment, as apposed to a garment.

Anni Albers work is recognized as part of the Bauhaus work, but is fundamentally unique to the rest of the work being produced at the school.