Adriene Cruz is a textile artist based in Portland, Oregon who has exhibited work locally and internationally.
Photographer: Romney Mueller- Westernhagen
Harlem native Adriene Cruz creates brilliantly colored fabric art embellished in rhythmic improvisational arrangements of cultural beauty. Her creative vision has garnered invitations to create beyond fabric to public art in Portland allowing her imagery to flow from textile creations to concrete fabrications. Adriene has exhibited her textiles internationally in Brazil, Costa Rica, and South Africa and Nationally at the Smithsonian, The Folk Art Museum, NY, American Craft Museum, NY, The Museum of the African Diaspora, San Francisco, The National Civil Rights Museum, Memphis, and the Fowler Museum of Cultural History, UCLA, to name a few. She’s included in collections at the Schomberg Center for Research in Black Culture in Harlem, Haborview Medical Center, Seattle, Portland Community College, Reed College, and numerous private collections. Learn more @thedreamerswindow and www.adrienecruz.com.
Power Prayer for the Community, 2024, textiles; mixed media; beads; shells; dried lemongrass sachets
preparing work for exhibit at The Guardino Gallery in Portland, 2015
Threaded Rituals
Daydreaming Again, 2023.
The Interview
This interview was conducted between Jae Nichelle and Adriene Cruz on October 21, 2024.
Thank you so much for sharing photos of your process! I’d love to learn more about “Threaded Rituals.” How did these pieces/ installation come to be?
Thank you so much for your interest in my work! “Threaded Rituals” is very much about appreciating the journey or channeling the flow of energy and spirit that happens with the push and pull of needle and thread. It was created summer of 2021 outdoors in my yard as I was feeling connected to many generations of stitchers. I was inspired to begin by the remnant of an appliquéd piece from India I found at a studio sale.
You studied art in high school and college, so it seems like you developed an interest in an art career at an early age. If you could give your teenage self inside knowledge about your future career, what would you say?
I did have an early interest in making things but a career never entered my mind. What I’m doing now is completely different from what I was doing in high school which was stone and wood sculpture and college was still three-dimensional work. Honestly, I never thought of it as an art career, creating has always been about being in a safe place to be and feel free. What I would tell my teenage self? Probably to enjoy life and have some fun! Be comfortable in my skin! I was painfully shy and missed out a lot on just living.
The way you sew objects into your quilts is incredible. What types of objects are resonating with you at present?
I love collecting textile remnants, beads, and talismans that have a tribal feel especially if it’s mirrored or embroidered. I also love using cowrie shells and sequins. In the piece I created honoring my mother, I used her rings and other bits of her life like the tiny silver key to the 66th-floor ladies' room of One World Trade Center.
You've completed various public art installations around the city of Portland! Which has been the most memorable experience?
The one I couldn’t imagine myself doing, the interstate Max Lightrail station! My first and second response to the project was NO! It took more than a minute to wrap my head around how I could apply my textile designs to a hardscape environment. Thankfully I was guided by a veteran public artist Valerie Otani who suggested applying my ideas to concrete, steel, glass, and bronze. Once the materials were chosen I was free to design as I wished. It was definitely a learning curve!
What are your favorite places in Portland to spend your time?
I’m very much a homebody so my favorite place in Portland is home! If we broaden it, my favorite place to spend time in Oregon is the ocean! Broaden it further and my favorite place to spend time is Cuba!
I'm curious to know what your workspace is like. Do you create from home or in a studio?
My studio is up in the attic of where I live and in the warmer months I set up in the backyard, nothing beats natural light.
What's uplifting you these days?
I’m blessed with beautiful circles of creative women. Some are very much younger than me and the others are my peers. The energy shared with them is always uplifting. Also my doggie Bindi! She’s a three-year-old rescue I’ve had for a year, my anti-depressant after losing my Mom in 2022.
Do you have a specific process for titling your pieces, or do the titles just come to you?
Sometimes it’s from a phrase or poem I’ve heard that gives me a feeling I want to see. Sometimes I’m creating and the piece tells me its name. I wish I could remember the name I originally had for “Threaded Rituals," it slips my memory now. While creating I was feeling good, totally immersed in the process when it let me know the name I was working with was not its name. I’m like, what? “That’s not my name!" Several nights I spent dreaming what the name could possibly be. Ritual came up first and then after a few days of threading needles, fabric, beads, shells, sequins, and whatever it became so obvious “Threaded Rituals!” Of course! From then on the piece really flowed.
How can people support you right now?
Oh wow! That’s a big question! Lots of love and encouragement! Help me get my book going, places to get away, beach house, or whatever! Money is always helpful, too! Ha ha, I can dream!
Name another Black woman artist people should know.
Easily my mentor of 30 years, Valerie J Maynard who also left us in 2022 at 85. She was amazingly prolific and encouraged many creatives to challenge self-imposed boundaries. Another stellar, prolific artist among the living is Xenobia Bailey. A beautiful soul conjuring soulful creations.
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