Heidi Kumao: "Fabrications: Stitched and Animated" Opens in NYC

Heidi Kumao, “Deliberate,” 2025, 17 x 20.5 x 1 inches, Thread, stitching on industrial felt, mounted to wood

Fabrications: Stitched and Animated, a solo exhibition of new narrative fabric works and experimental animations by Stamps Professor Heidi Kumao, is on view through October 25, 2025 at Ceres Gallery in New York City.

Kumao combines thread drawings and fabric cutouts on industrial felt to create minimalist images of conversations and relationships. Similar in form to a New Yorker cartoon, each piece distills the emotional and psychological tenor of an interaction down to a single key moment.

These textile and animated works are episodic, a collection of potent moments fabricated from memory, and stitched together as necessary parts of a greater whole. Reimagined using sewing, fabric cutouts, thread and wool, these tactile depictions are intentionally imperfect, missing details much like any recollection. In the current political climate, truth is often sidelined or distorted, and facts dismissed as fabrications. These works resist this erasure by highlighting personal storytelling as a necessary and powerful tool of preservation. By freezing moments of vulnerability and precariousness, the textile works focus on the unspoken power dynamics of workplace and domestic relationships.

The stop motion animations, “35 Days” and “LADIES.” are also composed from a series of discrete interactions and use humor and absurdity to recount lived experiences from the pandemic and mid-20^th century office culture. In “35 Days,” neighborhood callers provide clues (some helpful and some not) in the search for a lost cat, ultimately weaving together and revealing a community of care during the most isolating period in modern history. “LADIES.” uses physical slapstick to depict and disarm the stereotypical roles and invisible gender politics that exist in traditional workplaces. It features Stamps Lecturer Melanie Manos.

Support for this exhibition has been provided by The University of Michigan Office of the Vice President for Research and the Arts Initiative.

Kumao will be present in the gallery during the opening week, as well as closing day.

Thursday, Oct. 2, 6 – 8 p.m. (reception)
Saturday, Oct. 4, 3 – 5 p.m. (reception)
Saturday, Oct. 25, 3 – 6 p.m. (closing)

Fabrications: Stitched and Animated
Ceres Gallery
547 W. 27^th st., #201, NY, NY 10001
Regular gallery hours: Tues-Sat, 12 – 6pm