A Romance in Lower Mathematics
Kelly Dzioba
March 27 - May 9, 2025
Receptions:
Opening reception: April 4 | 5-8pm
Artist Talk: April 4 | 6:30pm
First Friday Reception: May 2 | 5-8pm
A Romance in Lower Mathematics describes the moment when a collective whole becomes greater than the sum of its parts, when we see the forest through the trees. Binary by nature, the work of Kelly Dzioba relies on a simple form of connection to dictate the rules of her process. The work draws inspiration from the 1965 animated short The Dot and the Line: A Romance in Lower Mathematics by Chuck Jones and Maurice Noble, where a line discovers complexity and depth within itself in pursuit of its true love : the dot. “But the line was bursting with old love and new confidence, and he was not to be denied. For now he was dazzling, clever, mysterious, versatile, erudite, eloquent, profound, enigmatic, complex, and compelling.”
Similarly, Kelly Dzioba’s work explores the idea of connection—both literal and metaphorical. Each piece is born from an accumulation of repeated gestures—twisting, connecting, and knotting materials until they form cohesive structures. Dzioba is fascinated by the moment when that accumulation of individual stitches, knots or threads gather to describe something of much greater meaning; a cloth, membrane, textile, or vessel. The minimalist, geometric, and expressive works in this exhibition seek to find that romance, to create moments of limbic resonance while pushing against the bounds of rule-based making.

About The Artist
Kelly Dzioba, a Connecticut based textile artist, received her BFA from The University of the Arts in Philadelphia in Craft & Material Studies. A former Resident Artist at the Houston Center for Contemporary Craft, she is the recipient of the Peters Valley School of Craft Artist Fellowship, the Lenore Tawney Scholarship, and the William F. Daley Fellowship for study at Haystack Mountain School of Craft. Her work has been exhibited in the United States and abroad at The Textile Center in Minneapolis, MN, The Chautauqua Institution in Chautauqua, NY, High Tide Project Space in Philadelphia, PA, the Seoul Art Center Hangaram Design Museum in Seoul, South Korea, and Gallery Gao Shan in Helsinki, Finland.
Artist Statement
My work is an investigation of textiles as a form of process art. Applying universal elements of textile methods, I make recursive objects based on an accumulating gesture or connection. Similar to the act of weaving, patterns and structure are dictated by the rules of the process. Through the guiding principles of the grid I am able to find common motifs and access familiar aspects of material culture: gem cuts, athletic stripes, studded collars, and patchwork quilts. I converse in the visual languages of minimalism, geometric abstraction, textile tradition and kitsch handicraft as a means of taunting the hierarchy of art and craft. My current body of work is the result of haptic discovery and material learning, taking a single gesture- twisting strands of party bead necklaces together until they snap into a tension-held connection- and upon that action building an extensive vocabulary of processes. Working with party beads allows me to bring camp and visual decadence to formalism while exploring themes of value, taste, & consumption. At the root of this work is the need to find comfort and self-soothing in the obsessive nature of making and to find sensory stimulation in the enticing luster of these woven objects.
