The Artist’s books I make are capable of translating the complexity of feelings and the contradictions of life into a wealth of sensitive texture that is not afraid to get naked. The fragility knows of the crossing, of the voice of sharp, thin threads, of open and closed folds, of order and tangle, of transparencies and opacity, and it melts, despite the cuts, even in the balanced dialogue between paper and cloth.
From ‘Sulla Soglia’ di Laura Anfuso

In textile art works, I often use tarlatan, a cloth used to clean up excess ink from chalcographic matrices. It has a more or less dense weft, and can be rigid or soft. It lends itself to being printed upon. It can be frayed by removing the threads of the warp, creating openings that resemble lacerations, and it can be rewoven with threads of other colours.

It can be overlaid onto other fabric, and also onto card, thus creating different veilings. The linocut technique is used to print on it, the white spaces can be used to draw with the thread, obtaining a connection with the mark of the gouge.

Unwrapping, sewing and stitching up, overlaying, printing, knotting threads, tearing, inserting other fabrics and materials is all that I do, creating artist’s books or art works for walls.

I believe that the following comment left for me by a visitor to the exhibition ‘Superficie o Profondità’ (Surface or Depth) can best explain my work: “the sensitivity of the story, the light overlays of fragile materials, the tears, the wounds, also the engravings, created with an intentional “physical” force, visible only because the light reveals their shadows, bring you back towards Ithaca. The works of Cumer have the power to recall emotions which have laid dormant in a small corner of the soul. They have the power to help you remember the goal of your journey, with the backpack on your shoulder where your experiences, your wounds, your life are”.