Mettje Swift

Artist's Statement

I think of my work as jewelry for architectural spaces. I seek the elegant line and contemporary colors in fabric architecture.

Watching flags wrap the currents of the wind, fabric sculpted, temporal art, inspires my aesthetic . When I first hoisted a flag into the sun and wind against bright blue mountain skies, I knew I had found an artform that resonates with my love of the outdoors and my love of pageantry. Banners, are by nature public art. They not only adorn architectural spaces, but represent pride and human aspiration.

Through the years, I have adapted to fit new forms and structures for interior decoration, corporate workspace design and architectural spaces. I focus on balanced and kinetic suspended works. My design style is characterized by a free flowing line with organic forms. The installations are creatively adapted to the location. The use of natural and artificial light brings out the jewelry-like translucence of the fabric.

Biography

Mettje is well known for her incredible nylon fabric banner art. Born in Golden, Colorado, USA, she has lived most of her life in the American Southwest adjacent to the high desert plateau of the Navajo Reservation. Native American art influenced her love of patterns and adornment of simple structures. She began making and designing fabric art banners in 1978, opening her workshop, Banner Day Studio, in 1984.

In the early days, large projects came out of Denver, but with the economic crash of the mid eighties, Mettje turned to locally focused community projects for cities and towns. Here she discovered a whole new, and joyous, playground-the effect of outdoor light pole banners on community identity. She uses banners in landscape design, outdoor art, a unified urban design for streets, celebrations, and neighborhoods. Many of her ongoing clients date back to 1985. In Durango, Colorado she has collaborated, since 1991, on the creation of decorative outdoor street banners of unusual dimensions, making it an enduring and imagintive public art project.

Interior architectural fabric commissions have become a focus of her work The most intriguing recent works are large landscape tapestries and balanced, floating mobiles-suspended sculpture. Her clients include Facility managers for Universities, health and recreation centers, corporate offices as well as private individuals.

Just for fun, she made the "Legend Lodge" a 12' tipi. This led to a purchase and commission from the Buell Children's Museum in Pueblo, Colorado. This included 5 soft sculpture, stuffed lizards and 10 soft sculpture animal costumes.

In 1995, Mettje relocated her banner production studio to Del Norte, Colorado where she has sufficient space with high ceilings in an 120 year old adobe warehouse. Here she is free to investigate and develop new ideas. She employs from five to eight craftswomen at Banner Day Studio. New technology has brought the world to her and she uses the internet to market her work nationally and internationally, as well as to take good care of long time patrons.

From regional street art to aerial mobiles in atrium spaces, the kinetic fascination of the art form continues.