Lia Cook

With the use of a digital jacquard loom, Lia Cook weaves portraits of people and animals, and creates monumental works that blur distinctions among computer technology, weaving, painting, and photography. Cook developed an interest in the way we respond emotionally to these weavings of photographs, as well as how we physically interact with them. Lia Cook Artist Statement “I work in a variety of media combining weaving with painting, photography, video and digital technology. My current practice explores the sensuality of the woven image and the emotional connections to memories of touch and cloth. Working in collaboration with neuroscientists, I am investigating the nature of the emotional response to woven faces by mapping in the brain these responses and using the laboratory experience both with process and tools to stimulate new work in reaction to these investigations. I am interested in both the scientific study as well as my artistic response to these unexpected sources, exploring the territory between scientific investigation and artistic interpretation. “