"In 2020, satellite imagery showed California wildfire smoke colliding with Hurricane Sally and Hurricane Paulette off the east coast of the U.S. It was “climate change in a picture” as one headline read. While the hurricanes seemed like far-away phenomenon, the smoke from the wildfires had become part of my yearly reality - closing elementary and middle schools for my kids, causing us to flee in our car to Utah where my parents live to escape unbreathable air. It was a drive I became very familiar with, over the Sierras and into Nevada, over the Rockies and into Utah. But the smoke would often follow us as we watched Purple Air to see Utah Valley
creep from yellow to orange to red. The “land” or bottom layer in this piece is filled with plastic Amoco (the oil company) yarn. It is made from polyesters and synthetics, the most common yarn used in today’s clothes. When burned with a heat gun these yarns become toxic (I opened a window and should have worn a mask). The “land” in my weaving twisted. Fibers melted, some turned to ash. But the flax linen warp and supplemental linen weft seemed untouched by the process. " - Kira Dominguez Hultgren