Alison Elizabeth Taylor Is a Wizard with Wood
Artist Alison Elizabeth Taylor’s graphic wooden inlays belie her skills as a craftsman and her fine art background. This month, the artist is featured in Crafted: Objects in Flux, a new exhibition at Boston’s Museum of Fine Arts, where her marquetry work is contextualized by 3D printed jewelry and new age textiles. Take a tour of her studio here.
Crafted: Objects in Flux is on view until January at the Museum of Fine Arts Boston, mfa.org.
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The artist in her Brooklyn studio.
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“During grad school, I was drawn to marquetry because I wanted to work with something that had a heavy history.”
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“This is a collage I made in college. It’s one of the only things I’ve kept from that time.”
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“I have a compulsion to be in my studio.”
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“At the beginning, there was so much trial and error. I remember kids in my grad school classes worrying about theory when I kept thinking: ‘I got to get back to my studio and learn how to sand.’”
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“My process is multi-stepped. I begin with drawings and paintings to develop the designs.”
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“I love that marquetry has the ability to memorialize.”
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“My piece that is up is from a series I did that was based on foreclosed homes. It’s called Tap Left On. It refers to a Victorian house I saw that a couple had lovingly restored, but that when the bank foreclosed on them—they left the tap running on the 2nd floor. I found it fascinating they were willing to destroy something that they had spent so long on improving.”
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“I build my characters kind of like a fiction writer—they are the combination of many different people I know.”
