Current Exhibition
Covering S
2025
Plastic bags, laser-cut acrylic
19 x 21 in
Coverings: An Exploration of Plastic, Fashion and Humanity examines the ways in which humanity has covered itself in plastic through the acceleration of fast fashion trends.
The show reimagines our clothes and accessories as "coverings," created with discarded materials, symbolizing a challenge against the fashion industry's wastefulness.
This inversion of function is central to the piece Threads of Blood, which exposes the hidden cost of disposable fashion.
In the 2015 documentary The True Cost, garment workers from the developing world expressed that the low prices of fast fashion are made possible only through their exploitation and suffering.
As director Andrew Morgan put it: "Someone, somewhere, is paying the true cost" – often with their health, dignity, and even their lives.
Threads of Blood
2025
Fabrics, red sewing thread, clothing, and linen tags
34 x 15 inches
The garments and accessories featured in Coverings are modeled by laser-cut images of some of the program's participants, intentionally centering their presence in dialogue with the artwork.
Covering E
2025
Plastic bags, laser-cut acrylic
19 x 21 inches
Covering K
2025
Plastic bags, laser-cut acrylic
24 x 21 inches
Covering I
2025
Plastic bags, laser-cut acrylic
28 x 21 inches
The exhibition also serves as a metaphor for covering in the sense of providing support, dignity, and opportunity. By hiring underserved individuals as artist assistants, The Gleaning Project creates a form of social "covering" – offering work, skill-building, and visibility to those on the margins.
Our series of collages has been a through-line of the Gleaning Project's exhibitions over the years.
This year's collection, Fibers, features fabric scraps combined with other discarded materials, such as used tea bags, multicolored tissue paper, and milk cartons stripped of their printed layers.
This process of stripping the old and layering on new materials is itself a form of covering and recovering, lending yet another layer of meaning to the show's explorations.
Fibers #2 | 2025, Mixed fibers, 14 x 11 inches.
Fibers #1 | 2025, Mixed fibers, 14 x 11 inches.
Fibers #3 | 2025, Mixed fibers, 14 x 11 inches.
Fibers #4 | 2025, Mixed fibers, 14 x 11 inches.
Fibers #5 | 2025, Mixed fibers, 14 x 11 inches.
Fibers #6 | 2025, Mixed fibers, 14 x 11 inches.
Fibers #8 | 2025, Mixed fibers, 14 x 11 inches.
Reminiscence speaks to the quiet persistence of memory. This piece offers a softer reckoning—a tactile map of the past folded into the present. Each strand, each worn fiber, carries the imprint of a gesture, a life, a choice.
As we move toward change, Reminiscence reminds us that the path forward is stitched through the past. Transformation is not a clean break but a layering—of histories, mistakes, resilience, and care. What we discard does not disappear; it gathers, softens, waits to be reworked into something new.
Reminiscence
2025
Mixed fibers
16 x 30 inches
Handcrafted from discarded plastic bags, this unique collection of purses transform waste into wearable art. A crocheted mesh body is paired with a soft cotton lining and a sturdy metal frame, joined by a cotton yarn handle. Both functional and symbolic, these pieces reflect Coverings’ exploration of sustainability, identity, and the power of handcraft to reshape the materials—and meanings—we carry.
Purses
2025
Cotton yarn, plastic, metal handle, fabric
12 x 15 inches
Totem
2025
Plastic Bags
14 x 98 inches
Alongside the Exhibition's overarching critique of extractive systems, we also tap into hope.
The window installation Totem stands as a reminder of our collective stories, our roots, and our ability to return to sustainable practices. It calls on us to reclaim our humanity, weaving a future where innovation and responsibility coexist.
This Exhibition is not just about what we wear – it is about what we value, what we discard, and what we choose to recover.
Coverings is on view at Neighbor, 176 9th Ave, from June 5 - June 30, 2025.
