Andrea Dupree
Maternal Memory, 2025
linen & cotton calendar towels, beeswax, ink, wool thread 3.5' x 5.5'
Maternal Memory layers fragments of deconstructed calendar towels, inherited from my maternal grandmother, with embroidery (representing plaque that forms in the brains of Alzheimer's patients) alongside birds and blossoms. This is a textile meditation on time, loss, and remembrance. Inspired by personal experience with dementia, the work holds the dissonance between measured days and fading recall. Cardinals, hummingbirds, and flowers - symbols of continuity, hope and renewal- float across the grid of distorted days, echoing both rupture and persistence. This piece becomes a quilt of memory: tender, fractured, and luminous in its devotion to what remains.
Andrea Dupree
Curious Wearables, 2025
felt, thread, vintage beads, upcycled fabrics variable
A constellation of embroidered brooches—eyes, flames, serpents, leaves—becomes a series of wearable altars. Each piece draws from sacred iconography, reimagined through fiber as intimate, portable symbols of protection, remembrance, and vision. Together they form a devotional language stitched in color, thread, and light.
Andrea Dupree
Mandorla, 2024
wool felt, Eco Vita organic wool thread, variscite, pearl 5.5" x 3.5" x .5"
Part of an ongoing altar series, Mandorla weaves together felt, stone, and thread into a sacred threshold. Framed by variscite and grounded with pearl, the form of the mandorla—a symbol of union and divine encounter—emerges in hand-stitched wool. This piece invites contemplation of portals, altars, and the spaces where opposites meet to hold transformation.
Andrea Dupree
Perception Reflection, 2024
wool, cotton & metallic embroidery thread, wool felt, firestar fibers, Swarovski crystal, mirror on wood panel 32" x 10" 2"
In my piece titled Perception Reflection, I explore the profound duality of the human iris—both as a miraculous biological structure and as a symbolic window into our inner selves. The iris grants us the ability to perceive the world, yet it also serves as a mirror, inviting others to reflect their own perceptions back at us. Constructed by hand using DMC Eco-Vita, metallic and cotton embroidery floss, needle-felted wool and firestar fibers, and mirror on a wooden panel, this work embodies the intricate beauty and functionality of the iris. The mirror pupil symbolizes the idea that "your perception of me is a reflection of you," reminding us that our connections with others are shaped by individual experiences and interpretations. Just as the iris encompasses both vision and reflection, this piece invites viewers to consider the miracles woven into our everyday lives: the marvel of human anatomy, Earth, the universe and the complex tapestry of perception that shapes our interactions and understanding of it all. In celebrating the iris, I invite viewers to ponder the miracles inherent in our ability to see and be seen, both literally and metaphorically.
Andrea Dupree
Solstice, 2025
wet-felted wool, ramie, flax, sari silk 24" x 4"
Layers of hand-placed fibers radiate from a glowing center, recalling the sun at its height. Depending on its placement—hung vertically on a wall or resting horizontally on a table—the piece shifts in dialogue with its surroundings, reflecting and refracting light in ever-changing ways. Both sturdy and delicate, Solstice honors the turning of seasons and the luminous balance between structure and radiance.
Andrea Dupree
Remembering Land, 2023
cotton dyed with found rusted metal, vinegar, acequia water and kochia leaves 24" x 24"
From my ongoing ecological art project, Sense of Place. Sense of Place is an ongoing ecological art project exploring relationships between people and environment in Northern New Mexico through re-contextualized found materials, paths and ritual acts. The project site is located in Po-Woh-Geh-Owingeh “Where the water cuts through”; situated on land that was once a homestead ranch, surrounded by and surrounding land of the Pueblo of San Ildefonso, and shadowed by the once secret city of Los Alamos (birthplace of the atomic bomb). These dynamic layers of land use are ever present in my mind as I explore paths to understanding this place. Guided by Ecofeminist principles, I aim to examine site-specific history alongside parallels between colonization, discarded materials, open dumps, invasive plants and patriarchal mindset of gender, race, class and the environment. By referencing spiritual and religious traditions of altars, meditation gardens, processions and prayer cards, Sense of Place seeks to offer opportunities for reflection and reconnection.
Andrea Dupree
Home Notes, 2025
hand-felted wool, oyster shell 9" x 3" x 5"
Wrapping memories of harsh places in softness.
Andrea Dupree
Wool Vessel, 2025
wet-felted Corriedale wool 18” x 24” x 18”
Formed through a slow, embodied process, Wool Vessel honors ancestral methods of shaping wool with water, breath, and repetitive motion. Felted entirely by hand, this hollow form serves as a tribute to the invisible labor embedded in material histories and the tactile wisdom of domestic craft. Inspired by regional sheep traditions and land-based practices, the vessel echoes the curves of both body and landscape. It's an homage to containment, transformation, and care. As with many works in my current fiber art project Gathered and Felt, the piece draws attention to wool not only as a material, but as a record of labor, ecology, and interdependence.
Andrea Dupree
Portal, 2024
wool & metallic felt, Eco Vita organic wool thread, variscite 6" x 3.5" x .25"
Portal is a tactile meditation on perception, thresholds, and transformation. Hand-embroidered onto a base of wool and metallic felt, this piece functions as both adornment and altar—an object to carry or contemplate. Radiating from the center, fine stitches in naturally dyed Eco Vita thread draw attention inward, toward the variscite stone nestled like an offering. Rooted in metaphysical inquiry and informed by Catholic iconography, the work references mandorlas, sacred hearts, and visionary sight. It is part of an ongoing body of wearable fiber altars—intimate objects that honor unseen energies and invite the viewer to sense the symbolic layers embedded in material, form, and gesture.
Andrea Dupree
Deconstructed Cycles, 2025
hand-felted wool, flax & ramie 21” x 12” 5”
A contemplative collection of vessels and fragments, Deconstructed Cycles explores the mirrored rhythms of plant life and emotional landscapes. Using hand-felted wool, flax, and ramie—materials chosen for their organic memory and textural vulnerability—I reflect on decay, transformation, and renewal. Each form is shaped through a meditative felting process that embraces collapse as part of creation. The piece invites a slow reading of embodied grief and growth, tracing the invisible labor of inner and ecological change. Rooted in an ecofeminist ethos, these objects act as soft reliquaries for what is shed and what persists.
