Kay Sekimachi

Monofilament Sculptures
Kay Sekimachi’s series of monofilament sculptures began in 1963 as an experiment to weave a wall hanging in multiple, translucent layers. After weaving a linen sample, Sekimachi realized she could produce three-dimensional forms using a nylon monofilament material (now commonly known as fishing line) that DuPont introduced in 1959. Sekimachi wove her monofilament sculptures as flat, interlocking layers that when suspended, folded-out into stratified, cascading shapes—suggesting billowing, organic forms that she named after natural phenomena. Ogawa, on display here, translates from Japanese to “little river” or “stream.”

Due to their complexity, each monofilament design was carefully plotted on graph paper prior to weaving. As she developed her first series, Sekimachi’s monofilament sculptures grew progressively larger and more intricate. In the last version of this series, each inch of multilayered monofilament required more than an hour to weave. One of Sekimachi’s monofilaments was included in Objects: USA, a landmark survey of contemporary American craft at the Smithsonian Institution in 1969. When the Smithsonian’s Renwick Gallery reopened three years later, the inaugural exhibition included another monofilament by Sekimachi that was purchased for the permanent collection.

“I love the fact that even after it was woven, it was almost like a screen. You could see right through it. I loved to see the layers as they overlapped, seeing one through the other.” —Kay Sekimachi, 1993

Detail of Ogawa II  1969
Kay Sekimachi (b. 1926)
six-layer-woven nylon monofilament, glass beads, plastic tubing 
Collection of Forrest L. Merrill
L2023.1101.001

Rivers
Building on the success of her loom-woven sculptures, in the 1970s Kay Sekimachi adapted nylon monofilament to the centuries-old, off-loom technique of card weaving. Sekimachi created a series of hanging sculptures that she named River, stating, “I thought of them as rivers because they were narrow and long and sometimes the warp threads were twisted and sort of hung free, and then they came together again.” To weave such long and complex shapes off the loom, Sekimachi employed a six-foot-long, cribbage-like board made by her husband, the master woodturner Bob Stocksdale (1913–2003), that could accommodate up to 400 warp threads and 100 cards. With her preference to focus on one medium and technique at a time, Sekimachi then substituted linen for monofilament and created the Marugawa series of card-woven tubes, naming them for a Japanese word that translates to “round river.”    

Detail of Marugawa III  c. 1974
Kay Sekimachi (b. 1926)
card-woven linen
Collection of Forrest L. Merrill
L2023.1101.004

Exploration
In 1951, Kay Sekimachi traveled with a group of friends to hear master weaver Trude Guermonprez (1910–76) lecture at the Pond Farm Workshop in Guerneville, Northern California. The lecture was a watershed moment for Sekimachi, who recalled, “suddenly as Trude talked and explained weave constructions and the relationship between the draft and the harnesses, it all became clear.” During the summers of 1954–55, Sekimachi studied with Guermonprez at California College of Arts and Crafts (CCAC, now California College of the Arts) and began an exciting period of artistic exploration. Guermonprez introduced Sekimachi to double-weaving and encouraged her to experiment with the loom. She illustrated how longitudinal warp threads, which are traditionally covered by horizontally crossing weft threads, can be brought to the top layer and accentuated in more artistically creative, open-weave designs. Sekimachi explained that at CCAC, Guermonprez “made it all logical…she was a wonderful teacher and she really made you think, and she made you want to go on and explore on your own.”  
 
Sekimachi received a scholarship to study at Haystack Mountain School of Crafts in Liberty, Maine, in 1956. She studied with textile designer Jack Lenor Larsen (1927–2020) and wove Intellectual Stripes (on view in exhibition) as a class project. When she returned home, Sekimachi wove Fishnets (pictured above), inspired by fishermen along the coastline of Maine and the challenge of working with different materials such as fiberglass yarn. She began to weave more abstract wall hangings in the late 1950s, along with large, semi-transparent room dividers for the open floor plan homes popular at the time. Sekimachi recalled the complex process of creating Room Divider (on view in exhibition): “I tied the warp off in groups of five threads, knowing that the groups of threads would have to be shifted in order to make the ikat pattern that I wanted....When the warp came out of the dye bath and dried, I cut away the wrapping and the warp was five inches of black, alternating with five inches of natural…Then the warp was spread in the raddle [a wooden bar with pegs that maintains thread spacing], and the warp threads shifted to make the pattern that I wanted. It was a lot of work.”

Kay Sekimachi at the loom in her home  1950s
Christina Gardner (active mid-20th century)
Berkeley, California 
Courtesy of Kay Sekimachi 
R2023.1102.003

Teaching
Kay Sekimachi began teaching while apprenticing at Ahrens Weaving Studio in Berkeley, making warps for new students and helping them thread their looms as classes progressed. With little formal training herself, in 1956 Sekimachi substituted for master weaver Trude Guermonprez (1910–76) at California College of Arts and Crafts (now California College of the Arts) after making a profound impression during two previous summer sessions. Sekimachi received a scholarship to Haystack Mountain School of Crafts that summer and assisted textile designer Jack Lenor Larsen (1927–2020) as a class monitor, helping students make warps and answering questions while working on her own assignments. 

By the mid-1960s, Sekimachi was teaching regularly scheduled classes in weaving at Berkeley Adult School and San Francisco Community College (now City College of San Francisco). She also taught at Mendocino Art Center and at specialized workshops throughout the country, returning to teach at Haystack, which had relocated to the coast of Maine on Deer Island, during the summers of 1973 and 1983 with her husband, the master woodturner Bob Stocksdale (1913–2003). Sekimachi made annual trips with Stocksdale to teach at Santa Fe Textile Workshops during the 1970s and early 80s. Her woven book Rainbow (pictured above) was inspired by the monsoons that Sekimachi and Stocksdale enjoyed in New Mexico on summer afternoons.   

Kay Sekimachi at Santa Fe Textile Workshops  1975
Santa Fe, New Mexico
Courtesy of Kay Sekimachi 
R2023.1102.006

"I use traditional tapestry techniques modified for my own personal needs. Rather than working in rigid color areas and interlocking weft, I try for a more fluid effect by [using] extra weft inserts and overlapping threads. This enables me to work more rapidly and improvise as the work progresses. In each tapestry I try to achieve a harmonious integration of design, material, and technique." —Kay Sekimachi, 1959

Detail of Reflection #2  1959
Kay Sekimachi (b. 1926)
plain-woven linen, cotton, and rayon; tapestry technique, wood
Collection of Forrest L. Merrill
L2023.1101.019

Inspiration
Kay Sekimachi has found inspiration in many ways. Her series of small, woven boxes began with an exhibition in 1975 at the British Craft Center in London that called for entries with a maximum dimension of eight inches. Intrigued by the challenge, Sekimachi recalled, “why not try weaving a box?” Using the double-weave pickup technique, she wove the boxes flat on the loom and then folded them into form—combining her love of textiles and the precision of Japanese origami.  

Sekimachi started a series of woven books in the early 1980s, inspired by a single-accordion-fold book of woodcuts by Japanese ukiyo-e artist Utagawa Hiroshige (1797–1858) that she cherished as a child. Using paper, dye, and a hot iron, Sekimachi transferred panoramic scenes onto two sets of warp threads—allowing for a double-accordion-fold and images on both sides of each book. To preserve the books’ rigidity and functionality, she carefully balanced interlocking warp and weft threads using a tightly woven fifty-fifty pattern.    

In 2006, Sekimachi reimagined transfer printing with a series of woven textiles titled Makimono. Inspired by the artistic scrolls of Japan’s Muromachi period (1392–1573) and the obi, or traditional Japanese silk sash, the designs on Sekimachi’s obi departed from her folded books in their use of bold tones and saturated colors that fade from one to the next. These scrolls signaled Sekimachi’s return to weaving two-dimensional artwork on the loom. In 2010, she employed a more subtle approach on a series of square, painterly weavings with muted, understated designs to honor the artists Paul Klee (1879–1940) and Agnes Martin (1912–2004).

Kay Sekimachi at the loom in her studio  May 25, 2023
Berkeley, California 
Photo by SFO Museum
R2023.1104.001