About the Artist
Elaine Bradford is interested in nostalgia created through processes and objects. Her grandmother taught her how to crochet and she has worked with the craft throughout her life. She began to use this and other traditional “women’s work” in her art for its connotations of personal history, hours of labor and concepts of comfort. She is also a collector, mining thrift and antique stores to find discarded pieces of people’s lives. She then transforms these objects with crochet, embroidery and collage. She brings them a new life in order to give the audience a glimpse into an alternate world. The connections made with yarn and thread become representations of relationships, both real and imagined. The work embraces oddity, often full of abnormalities and absurdities. Bradford is interested in public art and its ability to interact with viewers in ways that can’t be experienced in a gallery setting. When you come across an installation in an unexpected location, it can change a viewer’s perception of the possibilities of art, and hopefully bring a smile to their face. Her work often finds ways to involve the community in the process.
Bradford lives and works in Houston, TX. She holds an MFA from the California Institute of the Arts (2003) and a BFA from the University of Texas at Austin (2000). Her work has been included in numerous shows both nationally and internationally, including Lawndale Art Center in Houston, TX; Hyde Park Art Center in Chicago, IL; Jenkins Johnson Gallery, New York, NY; and Centre Culturel Aragon in Oyonnax, France. Select solo shows have been at Women & Their Work, Austin, TX.; Saint Gaudins Memorial, Cornish, NH; and Vanderbilt University in Nashville, TN. Bradford was one of the founding members BOX 13 ArtSpace, an innovative artist run studio and gallery space in Houston’s East End. She was a resident artist at the Houston Center for Contemporary Craft in 2010. In 2011 she completed a permanent civic art commission for the City of Houston at Vinson Neighborhood Library. Throughout 2017, she worked with Houston poet Sara Cress on a project where they created a “sculpture poem” every week of the year, which can be viewed at routinefables.com. Starting in 2018, Bradford has been an Artist Fellow at the Sandhills Institute in Rushville, NE and will be traveling there multiple times in the coming years to develop a project with the local community. In 2019 she completed a permanent public art commission that can be seen at the Heights neighborhood HEB grocery store in Houston, TX.
http://voyagehouston.com/interview/meet-elaine-bradford/
Bradford lives and works in Houston, TX. She holds an MFA from the California Institute of the Arts (2003) and a BFA from the University of Texas at Austin (2000). Her work has been included in numerous shows both nationally and internationally, including Lawndale Art Center in Houston, TX; Hyde Park Art Center in Chicago, IL; Jenkins Johnson Gallery, New York, NY; and Centre Culturel Aragon in Oyonnax, France. Select solo shows have been at Women & Their Work, Austin, TX.; Saint Gaudins Memorial, Cornish, NH; and Vanderbilt University in Nashville, TN. Bradford was one of the founding members BOX 13 ArtSpace, an innovative artist run studio and gallery space in Houston’s East End. She was a resident artist at the Houston Center for Contemporary Craft in 2010. In 2011 she completed a permanent civic art commission for the City of Houston at Vinson Neighborhood Library. Throughout 2017, she worked with Houston poet Sara Cress on a project where they created a “sculpture poem” every week of the year, which can be viewed at routinefables.com. Starting in 2018, Bradford has been an Artist Fellow at the Sandhills Institute in Rushville, NE and will be traveling there multiple times in the coming years to develop a project with the local community. In 2019 she completed a permanent public art commission that can be seen at the Heights neighborhood HEB grocery store in Houston, TX.
http://voyagehouston.com/interview/meet-elaine-bradford/