Kristin Ziegler
Centre Hall, PA
spacepastepress.com

Hot Pants
2024
Denim
12″ x 8.5″ x 2.5″

Artist Statement

In recent years I’ve been looking more critically at the components that make up my work and making a shift towards material reuse, thrift, and adopting art practices that are accessible to others. When an exhibit themed Blue surfaced, I pulled out three pairs of vintage painted and inked denim that I’ve been holding onto for twenty-five years. They are covered in imagery that spoke to me as a younger human. I wore them often, every patch and mend a symbol of sartorial defiance. I also scrounged thrift stores, made, or embellished my own clothes, and wore much of what I had until it was threadbare. Then it was punk; now these practices are part of the slow fashion movement and the adornment is called visible mending.

I cut and reorganized my once beloved denim into the cover and pages of Hot Pants. There were unexpected emotions as I mended holes, embroidered around existing images and remembered my teenage self. Hot Pants embodies both the techniques and aesthetics of visible mending, as well as the frayed temperament of adolescence.

I am not what I wear, yet my wardrobe plays a part in my identity, socioeconomic status, consumer choices, and values. In choosing to mend my clothes I acknowledge the process that goes into a garment’s manufacture. In the case of Hot Pants, a cotton seed eventually became a pair of jeans, and human hands and hearts were involved in every step to get there. Twenty-five years later I’m finding that mending and making still quietly weaves the threads of defiance, hope, and change.