Sewing for Sustainability

Rachel Breen works with Surendra Shekhawat at the studio of Dheeraj Chhipa in Bagru, Rajasthan. Bagru village is famous for its block prints, usually done with natural dyes. (Photograph courtesy Rachel Breen)

Rachel Breen learned to sew when she was 11 years old. “I sewed a lot of my clothes because my family could not afford to buy me the clothes I wanted,” she says. In graduate school, Breen started experimenting with a sewing machine as a drawing tool.

But when more than a thousand workers died in a garment factory building collapse in Bangladesh in 2013, Breen felt a connection with garment workers and their issues. In addition to maintaining an active studio practice, Breen is a tenured professor of art at Anoka Ramsey Community College. She was awarded a Fulbright-Nehru Academic and Professional Excellence Award (Research) in 2022 for a project titled “Textiles and Fair Trade: Using Art to Envision a Global Economy Based on Sustainability and Respect.” She spent five months in Jaipur at the Indian Institute of Craft & Design.

Excerpts from an interview with Breen.

Why do you work with used clothes and what do you create out of them?

The process of disassembling used clothes and crafting something new underscores the need to develop more just and sustainable garment systems. Creating installations with used clothes also embeds the histories of workers and wearers into my work, prompting questions about the impacts of overproduction on our climate.

I create various items by dismantling and restitching used clothes. I have made “collective garments”—clothing designed to be worn by groups of people, like a shirt with 11 sleeves or a dress with three neck holes. These serve as a metaphor for the collective action needed for social change. I have also crafted banners and pennants for exhibitions or to hang from buildings.

Rachel Breen in her studio, at a MacDowell artist residency, in New Hampshire. (Photograph courtesy Rachel Breen)

Please tell us about your Fulbright-Nehru project in India.

I explored the intersection of craft traditions, textiles, sustainability and fair trade, and social enterprises that prioritize treating workers fairly and providing safe working conditions. India has many garment factories and is renowned for its growing sustainable development and fair trade initiatives, supporting thousands of artisans and empowering women in their workplaces and daily lives. I wanted to learn about alternatives to the global garment industry specifically originating from people in India.

I met so many people who demonstrated exceptional thoughtfulness about materials and processes, including dyes, weaving and block printing. I also met people exploring circular design and no-waste design strategies, as well as those repurposing scraps from garment factories and turning them into new garments. I learned about sustainable craft processes and created work that reflects this research. I created some large banners utilizing the printing methods of Dabu, indigo dye, and handspun and woven organic Kala cotton. These banners were displayed at the Indian Institute of Craft & Design.

“Banners for the Commons” made by Rachel Breen during her Fulbright-Nehru project, installed at her host institution, the Indian Institute of Craft & Design in Jaipur. (Photograph courtesy Rachel Breen)

Have you shared your creations from your Fulbright-Nehru project with a wider audience?

Yes, I have exhibited the banners I created in India, titled “Banners for the Commons,” at the Weisman Art Museum in Minneapolis, and at the Alice Rogers Gallery in Collegeville, Minnesota. They will be exhibited at the Art Start Gallery in Rhinelander, Wisconsin. I have also given several talks about my Fulbright-Nehru research to numerous college classes across Minnesota.

Have your experiences with Indian textile artists influenced your later projects?

While I still feel as though I am “metabolizing” all that I learned and experienced in India, I have been greatly influenced by the way the making of fabric and textiles is ever present there. Throughout my Fulbright-Nehru project, I found myself constantly thinking, what would it be like to see and be aware of the daily process of fabric and clothing production.

I collected many kinds of materials throughout my project. Some were gifts, some were scraps. These materials are gradually being incorporated into the work I am creating now.

Please tell us about your upcoming projects.

I have upcoming exhibitions where I will showcase the banners I created during my time in India. I am also crafting a series of new banners made from used clothing that has been disassembled and reassembled. I am block printing on these used clothing parts with the hand-carved blocks I designed and commissioned in India—the same ones used for the banners created there. I employ the mark of the stitch as a symbol of human interdependence. I also created an image of two halves of a circle, symbolizing a yearning for coming together and being whole. These iconographies, along with some new ones, will be incorporated into all of the banners I am currently creating. The “mark” of my Fulbright-Nehru research will continue to be evident in this new work.

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