Mid2Mod: embroidery

Showing posts with label embroidery. Show all posts

Wednesday, July 10, 2013

Mariska Karasz

Mariska Karasz (1898-1960) was born in Budapest, Hungary. She was a fashion designer, textile artist and author.

Karasz immigrated to the United States as a teenager in 1913. She had learned to work with textiles as a young girl in her native Hungary and turned that knowledge into a successful career. By the 1920s she was a well-known designer of women's fashions. In the 1930s, she added a children's line and had a devoted following of clients.

In the 1940s, following World War II, a divorce and a fire in her studio, Karasz decided to take her career in a new direction and completely reinvent herself as a textile artist. She began to create elaborate embroidered wall hangings. These pieces were made of mixed fibers, metal, wood, paper, straw, leather and plastic. They were highly textured and had depth and dimension, qualities Karasz recognized as inherent in the medium, and she approached these designs as fine art. All were beautiful abstracts, and some, like The Trailer House and Split Level Ark, were slightly whimsical.

Karasz exhibited her work in museums and galleries across the country. She authored the book Adventures in Stitches: A New Art of Embroidery, and worked as guest needlework editor for House Beautiful magazine.

From mariskakarasz.com