Whitney Lee

Lee has subverted the craft world by interjecting sexy ladies into found latch hook rugs for some time. In her new body of work, Power Craft, Lee continues to subvert, infusing the usually domestic, private world of craft with dominance and power.  Lee’s imagery comes from craft stencils: a teddy bear with a balloon, a cat with a halo, a country goose. Lee takes these images that live on bedroom wall borders or on the kitchen dishtowel out of the home and puts them into the public domain.

One part of Power Craft is a collection of eight stenciled posters titled Craftiti. Each poster features a saccharine image of an animal that Lee has assigned to a specific Austin neighborhood. In the weeks leading up to the exhibition at Women & Their Work, these seemingly domestic subjects will start to slowly claim their territory taking over public spaces in their appointed neighborhoods. With these posters, Lee slyly comments on the male dominated world of street art giving these cutesy animals power they have never had before. No longer relegated to the domestic world, they now claim their territory like the marks left by inner city gangs. The posters have a political message but above all are intended to make us smile because a goose with braids is definitely a laughing matter.