Leonie Castelino creates intricate works of art in Contemporary Bojagi reflecting on societal issues with a focus on challenges women and girls endure.
Inspired by the ancient Bojagi Korean wrapping cloths, architectural seams and piecing with juxtaposition of color, her work breaks the tradition of straight lines and flat form with curved lines, jagged edges, creation of cloth with seams, layering to create complex colors, sculpture, suspended forms that turn and use of space.
‘Oh, the Places You’ll Go!’ By Dr. Seuss describes my meandering path to finally finding my creative expression inspired by Bojagi.
My mother broke traditions and was an inspirational figure to women. However, her sons had freedom to choose, I, her only daughter did not.
Love brought me to New York where I had total freedom in my marriage. As a pioneering woman with an MBA in New York City in the early 80s, I encountered challenges and bias against motherhood and a successful career was then cut short at 36.
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The curtailment of my aspirations as a girl and as a corporate executive because I was a young mother is imbued in my art in addressing dreams, prejudice, ignorance and the perpetuation of social traditions that still limit access to equality of both sexes.
I was unconscious that my story was my art, until I was preparing a lecture for a Conference at the SETEC Convention Center in Seoul for my Solo Show , ‘A Dream in a Dream in a Dream on Wings’: the right for girls to live, dream, experiment and reach for the stars. The titles of my work said it all. ‘Land of Dreams’ (America); ‘Metamorphosis’; ‘In flight’, and more.
Art was my creative outlet. For two weeks a year, as a stay-at-home Mom, my soul was fed by workshops at the Surface Design Association Conferences where I learned from world renowned artists – painting on silk with dye and gutta, tjapp printing, shibori, rozome and more. I finally found my metier in Bojagi at a Master Class in 2006 with Chunghie Lee at SAQA.
In 2008, I was invited for my first International Solo Exhibition of my art in textiles at the Irma Stern Museum, UCT in Cape Town, South Africa. This was featured in the Cape Times review by Veronica Wilkinson.
The exhibition in Cape Town was followed by an Exhibition of just Bojagi at the Philippine Embassy in Pretoria, South Africa. The North Korean Ambassador entered followed by the South Korean Ambassador. They met for the first time as my hosts introduced them. Their astonishment to see that their Korean artform was the inspiration for my Contemporary Bojagi united them emotionally as they walked together around the gallery. It was then that I realized the Power of Art to unite and inspire dialog on issues significant to me.
Chunghie Lee, founder and curator of ‘Bojagi & Beyond International Forums’ and ‘Hands Of Korea’ has been instrumental in the development of my exploration of Bojagi with her invitations to participate in every forum since 2007. I am part of the ‘Beyond’.
My first installation, a Solo Exhibition, at the SETEC Convention Center in Seoul, S. Korea was on the Rights of girls to live, dream, experiment, and reach for the stars. I felt impelled to use the Power of Art in this public platform to raise awareness of female infanticide – the millions of missing girls in China and India. The long white cocoon had 22 inspirational statements from my women friends from four continents on their achievement of their power.
Solo Installation
SETEC Convention Center, Seoul, South Korea
A work of art with a patchwork of flowers was created in 2014. Dissatisfied, I undid the hanging. I reached for it nine years later to create ‘Dancing to Life, Intertwining’.
Bojagi & Beyond Exhibition, Seoul, Korea
Invitations from Professor Lin Lecheng, of Tsinghua University, Beijing, Curator of ‘International Fiberart Biennale: From Lausanne to Beijing’ from 2006 to the present led to an Invitation as one of 13 Honored International Artists to exhibit at their 10th Anniversary in 2018 at the inaugural opening of the Tsinghua Art Museum in Beijing, China.
Jeju Grannies of the Sea
Legendary women divers of Jeju Island, South Korea
Installation
2014 Jeju Island, South Korea
2018 Tsinghua University Art Museum, Beijing, China
Invitations to group and solo exhibitions by Bibiana Huang Matheis, the founder and Program Director of ‘Inspiration Art Group International’ – www.inspirationartgroup.org – has provided me with opportunities to explore space, form and experiment.
Cocoons & Dances on Mobiles
2019
Installation
Exposure to the creativity and interaction with fiber artists at international juried exhibitions has been key to my development in inspiring new ways of thinking.
I am eternally indebted to the confidence and support of two artists, Cornelia Baker and Kiyoko Sakai, who facilitated my first two solo exhibitions in 2003 and 2004, which launched my career as an artist.
The generosity of invitations to exhibit, support and belief in me of these five individuals has provided fertile grounds for my expression for Fine Art in Bojagi.
I have always had a passion for the lost arts, and for the ancient dying textile traditions of Asia. I meandered for more than 10 years in my learning of gutta and dye, batik tjapp printing, shibori, rozome until I found Bojagi. By unconsciously breaking the ancient rectilinear traditions, it took on a life of its own a medium to creatively raise awareness of emancipation issues girls and women confront all over the world. In 2024, how much has changed in the pursuit of equality of opportunity to succeed? Is it prejudice against the abilities of women? Or is it just adhering to social traditions to resist change?
‘3D Expression” SAQA Global Exhibition 2029 – 2023
‘Freedom to be’ is a leitmotif in my art. I am fascinated by form, shape, and movement with the ethereal fabric of organza.
Bojagi has been my inspiration to break with the folk rectilinear tradition and creatively pursue innovations in form, shape and movement with each work of art.
Unconsciously, each work of art evolved using Bojagi patchwork and traditional architectural seams first with jagged edges, curved seams, incorporating sculpture, creating cloth with these seams, layering for complexity of color, 3-D forms that floated, narratives, suspended cocoons, dances that moved, mobiles, and finally using these in installations with narratives on women’s issues.
2019
Mobile
Deeply moved by Irene Osborne’s visceral sculptures of women in distress led to a video collaboration with her and Esmeralda Lyn, researcher and writer with the foremost think tank, Institute for Women’s Policy Research. We discovered the writings of François Poulain de la Barre 3-part treatise on ‘The Equality of the Two Sexes’ written in 1673. He sought to understand the basis of prejudice and the motives against women’s abilities to succeed. It was an incredible collaboration of ideas that finally found a story that attempted to understand with my art in textiles, Irene’s sculptures and Esmeralda’s research and writing.
‘BREAKING FREE’ was the inaugural video broadcast program on Inspiration Art Group International’s platform launched by Bibiana Huang Matheis in March 2021. Original music for the video was composed by Bibiana Huang Matheis. Each of us were enriched by our dialog for this collaboration.
Image from ‘Through the Wall’ sculpture by Irene Osborne
2022
In October 2022, Irene Osborn and I were invited for a Solo exhibition, ‘Breaking Free – Through the Wall’ of my Bojagi hangings and sculptures in textile with Irene’s sculptures in clay and bronze at the Pacific Northwest Quilt and Fiber Arts Museum in Washington State. We were so appreciative that our story which focused on understanding the historical prejudice for full emancipation of women and the continuing challenges was reviewed in depth by Lynette Chartres in Olyarts.org.
Artists work in isolation, so I was surprised and honored that my work was featured in the French Magazine, Ateliers d’Art’ (Jun-Jul 2021) cover story on 13 artists around the world exploring color in different media. This work was in progress over nine years.
Featured in the book ‘Bojagi’ by Sara Cook (2019), I was identified with Chunghie Lee & Marianne Penberthy as one of three influential arts in Bojagi
and,
‘Metamorphosis’ was also featured as Fine Art inspired by Korean Folk Artform of Bojagi, in ‘The Ultimate Guide to Art Quilting’ by Linda Seward (2014).
Seward also included the Detail of ‘Cross Currents’ in the section on Patchwork – Bojagi seams to create cloth
Featured in Seoul publication, ‘Bojagi and Beyond II’ by Chunghie Lee (2014) for use of color,
and in
Romanian Treatise ‘Amprente Culturale in Arta Fibrelor’ by Prof. Anna Maria Orban, Academia Romania for Korean folk art as inspirations for fine art.
My studio is my sanctuary. My pleasure is in the intellectual and creative process in thinking of innovative experimentation with form, design and shape. My limited inventory of fabric and colors is the exciting challenge to work within. Work starts with an idea and fabric selections and then there is so much unpicked, discarded as it doesn’t work. Creating these traditional Bojagi seams – fell, french and fine tripe seams – are very time consuming. The juxtaposition of color and shape, and the complexity of colors that emerge with layering is challenging. Sometimes it can take a year to create one work of art. Often, when the creativity is exhausted, I keep it aside for months or years and start something new before I return to it. When I do pick it up again, it can emerge totally different, as time has passed.
Image from ‘Through the Wall’ sculpture by Irene Osborne
2022
In 2022, Annie Heath, Korean-born American dancer, requested me to create the set design for a womb for her premiere solo performance, in New York City. It was a novel experience and wonderful to collaborate with her to interpret her performance to create this set.
In 2014, I exhibited a work – Homage to Hmong’ created from my collection of skirts of the Miao (Hmong Hill tribes of China) in “Seas of Blue: Asian Indigo Art’ at the Charles B. Wang Center. It was featured in the review of the New York Times. It was my first venture into identity in clothing – a narrative of the visual history of this tribe identified by their distinct design of their clothing, patchwork, batik patterns on indigo fabric, embroidery, patterns, colors and stitches. It was a work that paid homage to the women’s recording of their tribal history.
Later, in 2021, the Director of Charles B. Wang Center for from Stony Brook University, New York invited me to create two Mini-lectures on Patchwork.
The first link below is based on my collection of Tribal embroidery that embellish the women’s clothing of Indian nomadic tribes of Rajasthan and Gujarat, which are reused and revived to create stunning works of art or for the home.
The second video celebrates the exquisite extraordinary embroidery of the Hill tribes of South East Asia which mark their identity and a visual history of migration. With education, these traditions passed down through generations are vanishing.
I love collaborating with artists in other media. It is intellectual and stimulating to think from a different perspective as I learn about different media and the process of complete sharing to create of work of depth over months and sometime over a year results in deep friendships. I am currently collaborating with two other sculptors and learning to let go to be totally receptive to someone else’s conceptual ideas, so that the ultimate will evolve into the unknown with total freedom.
My life is enriched with art, family, friends, artists, books, travel and culture. International artists from different cultures in different media are inspirational and their friendship feeds my soul.
I deeply appreciate this invitation to reflect on my journey in Bojagi and the issues I care about.
The link below is a selection of my works of art to music composed by Bibiana Huang Matheis.
Selected Links:
- Virtual Exhibition, Breaking Free:
2. Review by Lynette Charters in Olyarts.org, Breaking Free – Through the Wall
3. ‘Bojagi – Korean Textile Art: Technique, Design and Inspiration’ by Sara Cook
4. ‘The Ultimate Guide to Art Quilting’ by Linda Seward
5. ‘Bojagi & Beyond II – Revised and Expanded’ by Chunghie Lee
6. Artist Profile by Frank Matheis, Inspiration Art Group International, ‘Leonie Castelino’s Art for the soul’
7. The Brick Theater, NYC and Exponential Festival 2022, NYC Set Design: Departure Study of Mother/Land by Annie Heath, Dancer
8. Video: MOTTAINAI – Reuse, Remake, Revive. Nomadic Tribes of Rajasthan and Gujarat
9. Video: MOTTAINAI – The Vanishing Embroidery of the Hill Tribes of Thailand and Vietnam
Learn more about Leonie: www.leoniecastelino.com
Follow Leonie on Instagram: #leoniecastelino
Enjoy this video with Leonie’s work: ‘The Art of Leonie Castelino’
Interview posted March 2024
Browse through more inspiring Bojagi work on Create Whimsy.