Simone Rocha on Louise Bourgeois

‘It was always very entwined, this idea of textiles and family, Louise’s work has always represented my family and my mother.’ Timed with Louise Bourgeois’s inaugural exhibition ‘Louise Bourgeois. Papillons Noirs’, now on view at Hauser & Wirth St. Moritz, fashion designer Simone Rocha discusses the late artist’s work, which she first encountered at the age of 16 at IMMA Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin. 

The exhibition includes a series of black fabric heads from the last decade of Bourgeois’s life when the artist was in her late eighties and early nineties. Bourgeois’s style of work included layering hand-sewn scraps of black terry cloth, tapestry, and fragments of her own clothing to form the features of her fabric heads. She employed familial techniques from her childhood and confronted her past by stitching together scraps of old fabric to gain a semblance of understanding and reconciliation.

Simone Rocha first worked in her father John Rocha’s atelier between the ages of 13 and 18 and later trained at the National College of Art and Design, Dublin and at Central Saint Martins, London. Her work looks back in time to explore historical forms and timeless beauty in her contemporary interpretations of femininity.

‘Louise Bourgeois. Papillons Noirs’ runs at Hauser & Wirth St. Moritz until 10 February 2019.

For more information, visit the Hauser & Wirth website here.