Panda Landa "Vessel Iii" Hand-Dyed Fabric, Checkered Triangle Textile Art in Aubergine and Blush, California Desert Art, Original 18 X 18 Inches, 2023

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In this textile wall art of hand-dyed fabric by California desert artist Panda Landa, a tall triangle of checkerboard patchwork, … Read more In this textile wall art of hand-dyed fabric by California desert artist Panda Landa, a tall triangle of checkerboard patchwork, pale butter yellow and blush pink, stands against a field of deep aubergine so dark it reads as night. The squares are small and slightly uneven, and the light colors seem to glow where they meet the dark. A faint seam rises from the apex to the top edge of the panel, as if the triangle were a tent pole or a candle flame. Panda Landa makes the VESSEL pieces by abstracting a container into a simple shape, and here the shape is a lantern against darkness. Second-hand cloth, hand-dyed, stitched and stretched over bars.

The dark ground makes this square work in moody rooms, a library, a dining room or a bedroom with deep paint. It looks sharp against charcoal, forest green and navy walls, and offsets velvet, dark wood and brass. In a pale room it becomes a strong graphic accent, hung by itself above a console or a chest.

Hand-dyed fabric on stretcher bars, 18 x 18 x 0.75 in (45.7 x 45.7 x 1.9 cm). Unframed.

Panda Landa builds each piece from second-hand fabric that is dyed by hand, then cut and sewn together by instinct and improvisation, letting the composition develop naturally. Seams join the cloths into bands, arches, triangles and spirals, and the dye is left to pool and bloom, so the mottling in each cloth stays part of the surface. The sewn panel is stretched over wooden stretcher bars about three quarters of an inch deep and is unframed.

Panda Landa (b. 1982) is a queer, non-binary visual artist and filmmaker raised in the Nevada desert and now based in Joshua Tree, California. Self-taught, they work through instinct and improvisation, making mixed-media textile pieces from second-hand fabrics that are dyed by hand, stitched and stretched over frames. Sustainability is central to the practice, and every cloth arrives with its own history.

Their ongoing series, including PORTAL, ALTAR, ECLIPSE, VESSEL and RITUAL, touch on queerness, identity, ancestral narrative, healing and transformation, and more recent beaded panels carry short, tender phrases in color. Landa made the 2022 film In the Middle of Everywhere and has offered a workshop on giving new life to clothes at the Joshua Tree Music Festival. See less