Interview: Chloe Bensahel

Chloe Bensahel (*1991) is a French-American textile artist based in Paris. Her work considers the role of textiles, and tapestry in particular, within the constitution and existence of individual and collective identity. Her Interactive Tapestries (2019– ongoing) explore the importance of touch in the creation of knowledge and understanding. Besnahel’s Transplants (2021 – ongoing) establish a relation between the movement and rooting of plants and people due to migration and Colonialism. By incorporating textile’s geopolitical, historical, and physical references, Bensahel’s work embraces the conceptual and the sensual, proposing a contemporary approach to a traditional technique.

How long does it take to complete tapestry, which is the procedure?

One tapestry takes about 2-3 weeks to complete it. The loom combines vertical and horizontal threads but you only weave on the horizontal axis. You create the design in form of a drawing which is placed below the warp and then followed with the thread. Since you only weave in one direction, there is a great freedom in weaving which I immediately fell in love with!

Why tapestry: What do you enjoy about making it, what do you feel you can express only in this medium?

I have always been interested in the body and regard textiles as a medium communicating both individual and collective identities. There are geopolitical, historical, and anthropological components of textiles which all feed into my work. For me, it is the best medium to talk about how bodies are defined and exist. Weaving in particular is a lot about ritual and rhythm and learning it, my body really felt it – I love doing it!

How did you first engage with the technique?

I did my undergrad at Parsons School of Design, which has a strong reputation for fashion design. After graduating I started working with Sheila Hicks, who introduced me to her friends in Japan, the founders of Jun Tomita Studio, a weaving workshop in Kyoto. I completed a three-months residency at the studio and learned weaving. After this, I held a residency at Halycon Arts Lab, Washington D.C. where I further trained the technique, and in 2018, I was an artist in residence at the Australian Tapestry Workshop in Melbourne.

Following your nomination of the Prix des Amis du Palais de Tokyo 2023, your solo exhibition at the museum just opened. What are the core points?

The exhibition presents an installation which pays homage to invasive plant species. The visitor walks through large interactive tapestries which generate light and music upon touch. The sound elements are performed by La Têmpete Company, a vocal ensemble whose practice unites music of different styles and origins.

The tapestries form part of your Transplant series (2021 – ongoing). By incorporating so-called invasive plant species, which were brought to Europe or ‘the West’ in a Colonial context and formed roots in these new geographies, you establish a relation to the movement and rooting of people due to Migration and Colonialism. Where does this idea come from?

My interest in the subject is grounded in my own biography, growing up in Paris and the U.S. with Jewish morrocan origins. Movement, roots, and identity form key concerns of my work.

Next to invasive plants, a large part of your tapestry work uses hand-crafted paper as material which you tore and twirl into a thread. Where does this idea come from?

It is a traditional Japanese technique to mend old garment; people stripped old manuscripts and used them as yarn. As part of my stay in Japan, I completed a residency at Awagami Paper Factory; for me, incorporating paper into the tapestry felt the perfect embodiment of text becoming textile.

Good keyword! Your group of work Words Weave Worlds plays with this relation between text and textiles. Which connection do you personally see personally the two?

The word “text” comes from Latin “textus” which means “interwoven”.  A good orator, historically, would be the one who weaves together his sentences into a speech. On the other hand, there is a strong relationship to technology being based on code, which, again, is a language system. The first computers were in fact based on the principles of the loom where you also have only two directions: up and down, positive and negative, or 1/0. The words are, thus, historically interlaced and I try to combine these different threads within my work.

Absolutely! In 2019, you collaborated with Google Jacquard and Google Arts & Culture, from which your Interactive Tapestries evolved. Upon touch, these tapestries create light and sound. What are your intentions behind the interactive design?

The Interactive Tapestries are connected to the role of text in religion. In Hebrew religion, text is only written in consonants, the reader has to fill in the vowels. It is as if (s)he had to breathing life into the text. I wanted to consider and materialize this idea within my work and make it performative. By weaving conductive thread into the tapestry and inviting the viewer to touch, the body becomes part of the work and its reception. The tapestry senses the proximity of the body and becomes a “lived other”, so to say. This gesture breaks down barriers and transforms the relation between the viewer and the work.

This is incredibly interesting! So, you feel a special importance of touch?

Yes, exactly. With the Interactives, I want to establish touch as new way of understanding. Today, knowledge is primarily perceived cognitively or visually. But there is a specific cognition in touch which I want to direct the viewer to through these works.

From January to March, your work was shown at Galerie Dittmar, together with the work of Rudolf Englert (1921-1989). Your works share a strong visual relation, despite their different media. Interestingly, his early drawings, dating from the 1960s, resemble the drawings from artists like Vera Molár who first engaged with computers.

Yes, his drawings are at the same time analytical and sensual. They seem to reach out into space while remaining on the page. It is this duality between plasticity and design, text and movement which I immediately loved!

Apart from the connection to text, you both share a strong connection to music and landscape. Which role do these two elements play in your work?

Music is a direct gateway to the personal sphere. Spoken or sung text often form part of the ritual of weaving, a tradition which I incorporate into my works by combining touch and music. Landscape for me is not a direct reference, but is manifested through the material and on a conceptual level. I work a lot with invasive plants such as hemp or linen and landscape is an abstract reference to their geopolitical origins. Speaking about knowledge and understanding, subjective perception and the structure of the brain may be seen as a system of roots which, again, relates to soil and landscape. In this sense, the text forms another kind of landscape within the work.

Your interactive pieces in the exhibition include sound elements by Caroline Shaw (*1989). Her compositions are situated between classical quartets and sound art à la Laurie Anderson (*1947). Where do you see connections between her work and yours?

I really love the remix culture! For me, Caroline’s compositions are super contemporary, being so familiar and so strange at the same time. Art can create the same experience by taking something familiar and making it unfamiliar. I don’t think the past is absent from the future and the future is present within the past. Caroline’s music comes from a similar approach, I feel.

Did you ever compose yourself?

Yes! For some of my early interactive pieces I created sounds by singing and using natural materials such as leaved and wood. Lately, I have been working with professional composers, though. I really enjoy their insights and the close collaboration!

Textile art is very much in, however weaving to me seems to remain a niche. Do you see yourself in certain tradition?

I feel close to all the women who paved the way for tapestries. Anni Albers (1899-1994), above all, was pioneering in this regard. She transported weaving to the next level, suggesting it as a way to see the world as more wholistic and intertwined. Magdalena Abekanowitz (1930-2017), in particular, formed the idea of the body holding memory which is also present in my work. Doris Salcedo (*1958) is formative for the use of materials, posing the personal as political and the idea of the individual experience radiating into a collective one. The 1970s, in general, were an incredibly important time for textile art because it left the wall and went into space. Showing my work with an artist who created within this period in this sense is truly an honour.

The opening of your solo exhibition at the Palais de Tokyo included a stunning performance with the Tempest Company, and you have worked with performance before – do you plan to continue performative vein?

I adore performance and feel it’s a deeply important part of my work! A next step might be wearable technology, using sounds that start in the body and are transported to the outside by textiles.

You are currently completing a residency at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and the Villa Albertine in Boston – what are you focusing on?

I am investigating a group of objects dating from the 1960s which were used in the NASA space exploration. These objects use a magnetic core memory system to store information within the textiles. My goal is to create a contemporary version of it, making the weaving thread more complex by implementing information within yarn and, thus, making the textile to the source of knowledge.

Amazing! On a different note, any intentions to engage with AI?

Good question! I am definitely very close to it: some of my interactive works already make use of a setting in which the computer selects the sound at random; thus, the machine is taking the decision, and not me. Working with technology, there are five different ways to arrive at the same outcome, one of them is AI.

I can’t wait!