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Embroidered portraits of friends and family sounds like a terrible idea for a serious art career but artist Cayce Zavaglia makes it work – and then some.
I had a great conversation with Cayce who is based in St. Louis. She makes remarkable portraits that look like paintings but are actually made up of hundreds of embroidered stitched. She also paints abstract paintings of the reverse side of her embroidery portraits.
Cayce is collected widely, her work is part of the permanent collection at the University of Maine, the West Collection in Philadelphia, and the Shoeni Collection in Hong Kong, to name a few.
We talk about sheep stations, funeral flowers, celebrities, closed mouths, glue guns, and art, lots of art and painting . . .
Here are the main points of what we talk about:
- Embroidery portrait origins,
- Choice of subjects,
- Photography,
- Substrates,
- Drawing,
- Background painting,
- Composition,
- Threads,
- Looseness,
- Embroidery and needlepoint,
- Instilling power,
- Abstract paintings,
- Second guessing yourself,
- Earlier work,
- Stitching and painting,
- Portraiture,
- Process and portrait,
- Craft and Art,
- Australian portraits,
- Art fairs,
- Family and work,
- Most moving portrait to make.,
- Big art dream,
- Chuck Close,
- Artistic challenges,
To find out more about Cayce and her work
http://www.caycezavaglia.com/
Most moving painting to make . . .

Aunt Lin by Cayce Zavaglia
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Theme music by The Argyle Pimps. Thanks lads.
In the interview with Cayce Zavaglia, she mentioned an interview with Jenny Saville that she had listened to several times. I would love to hear it… could you put a link up?
Thanks!
Hello Mona,
Here is a lint to the interview with Jenny Saville.