There is no more hopeful act than getting married. The selection of the wedding dress itself is one of the ways in which ideas of roles, values and importance are communicated. I am fascinated by the edges between cultures -- the places that they meet. These images of Thai wedding dresses all show the tension between and attempts to mediate among, layers of meaning, east and west, traditional and modern. While the stores of Phimai, Thailand do feature wedding dresses completely in the Western style, the great majority of the dresses in the windows preserve design aspects of traditional Thai formal or court dress including the belt at the waist and elaborate folds.

I was struck by the finding that the Anglo-American culture and the Khmer-Cambodian culture have both traditionally taught their children about roles and social expectations using the device of the days of the week. Each piece in this series explores one day of the week and is illustrated with a digital print of a vintage Khmer (Cambodian) postcard. The Anglo-American adages remind children that their place in the world is constrained by fate; the Khmer adages instruct children to fit in by selecting the right color of the day to wear in respect of their traditions.

The naga (snake) is a profound symbol in Thai thought and belief. The naga was essential in the churning the ocean of milk to create the universe of all things. The naga is the life force that flows through existence to protect people. As such, the naga is a recurrent theme in traditional Thai weaving. Thailand has a long tradition of hand spun and hand woven cotton textiles, one group of which is dyed in the warp (matmi). Contemporary matmi handwovens were collected in the Northeast area of Thailand, and re worked into these textiles, each of which presents a new expression of the naga.

For centuries, textiles from India were prized. During the 19th century, however, England was able to capture interational leadership in textile production through the combination of copying of distinctive Indian motifs (such as chintz and paisley) and industrialization. The Indian textile industry was virtually destroyed. In the mid 20th century, Ghandi made khadi cloth -- a hand spun and hand woven textile -- the symbol of the Indian struggle for independance from British colonization, industrialization and globalization. Working with Khadi cloth allows me to explore these themes.

These works explore the textile history, real and re-imagined, of the Pueblo peoples of the Rio Grande valley before, during and after contact with the Spanish beginning in the 16th century. The thriving cotton growing and weaving tradition of the Puebloan peoples was interrupted by the Spanish-imposed transition to sheep raising and wool weaving. Puebloan ideas of textile design leak through into these Hispanic textiles, but their design sensibilities find full voice in their pottery, which I have used in creating these compositions.

The pieces you will see here reflect my fascination with the contact edge between cultures -- west and east, old and new, homespun and machine, disappearing and emerging. These mixed media works incorporate traditional textiles collected from cultures as varied as the Hmong of Yunnan in China and rural women in Kenya with commercial textiles produced in Turkey, Japan and the United States. The selective juxtaposition of textiles enables me to work out issues I see as important in this edge between cultures.