Amy Firestone Rosen
Rethinking the Party Dress

July 1 - September 23, 2022
Opening Reception July 1, 5-8 PM

Amy Firestone Rosen creates large-scale prints that incorporate artifacts of our time, the Party Dress. She organizes pattern and texture to create works that range from fully non-objective arrangements of three-dimensional shapes to representations of figures and apparel. Her work addresses themes of fantasy of women and fashion.

The basis of Amy’s work is to create prints from upcycled garments. Hunting for dresses at second-hand stores and thrift shops is an important part of her practice. She searches for intriguing textural patterns found in garments that will translate into strong figurative images. The Party Dresses serve as printing plates, never to be worn.

Bio

Amy Firestone Rosen is a native of St. Louis, who returned after obtaining a BFA in Visual Communications from the University of Kansas. She worked primarily as a graphic designer for more than twenty years before a growing interest in printmaking led her to further education and an eventual studio practice as a printmaker. Her current work combines monoprints and collage techniques on layered, fibrous surfaces. Pattern and texture feature heavily in these works that range from fully non-objective arrangements of shapes to the representation of figures and apparel. Allowing fabrics and entire garments to serve as “plates,” she at once reduces these surfaces to their textural imprint and acknowledges the memory and intrigue they hold.

This exhibition is made possible with public support from the Missouri Arts Council, a state agency.