Akron Life September 2023

Krissi Riewe Stevenson (pictured) and Jennifer Meakins’ pieces photos by Talia Hodge

“Soft Boundaries II,” another piece in the exhibit, was made by Krissi Riewe Stevenson, a Kent State assistant professor of fashion design, and Jennifer Meakins, a University of Kentucky assistant professor in the School of Interiors. It is a partition that’s approxi mately 72-inches-tall, made out of recycled polyester yarn wrapped around tubes stuffed with pool noodles. “The front textile is not stretchy but the back is,” Stevenson says, “so it lets it kind of curl and move.” The pair worked together to brainstorm the piece, try out and select materials and program a digital knitting machine from the KnitLab.

That kind of back-and-forth collaboration allowed the duo to amp up from their previous “Soft Boundaries I” knitted works, which include a chair, wall panels and a garment. The bigger scale makes the piece jump off the gallery wall, and that’s exactly what you should expect to see at the exhibit. “It kind of folds and meanders and comes off of this sort of hard, white box of a typical museum space, and is able to really create something different,” says Meakins. “We’re able, because of our col laboration together, to look at other disciplines and bring them into each other.” 515 Hilltop Drive, Kent, kent.edu/museum // AS

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akronlife.com | SEPTEMBER 2023