Each of these samplers is derived from and pieced together from the same cream plaid blanket, which had been discovered in a thrift shop in a shrunken and consequently thickened form. The blanket’s palette is one of primary colors—black, green, yellow, and red—set in grids, reminiscent of the compositions of Piet Mondrian (Dutch, 1872–1944). Watt is thinking about the relationship between part and whole, the “Indigenous idea of using a material in its entirety so nothing goes to waste.”
“Unlike other work I’ve done, these compositions are reconstructed from a shared singular piece of cloth, one wool blanket. I’ve enjoyed having this parameter or limitation. I’ve seen how this relates to a Seneca and Indigenous principle of using all of a material without waste. In our community corn is harvested, dried for seed, and [the land] rotated for future crops. The cob is used as the nose core for a corn husk mask and of course the husks are made into dolls, mats, and utilitarian objects. When I first started using corn in graduate school, I was really interested in this relationship between corn husks, their cellular structure, and the relationship between part and whole. So in many ways this again feels like I’m returning to a theme.”