Rising Stars: Meet Luke Haynes

Today we’d like to introduce you to Luke Haynes.

Hi Luke, so excited to have you on the platform. So before we get into questions about your work-life, maybe you can bring our readers up to speed on your story and how you got to where you are today?
I fell in love with quilting because it represents a greater idea of comfort and utility. To be honest, it took me years to fully understand that idea and the reason why I, as a 36-years-old male, find so much of my identity and intrigue behind textiles and tactile art-making. I lived in 15 states and grew up in households without any real family presence. Because of those circumstances, I found empowerment in teaching myself self-efficiency and about how to build a nurturing home environment as just a pre-teen boy. It was always my priority to make myself feel cared for within an infrastructure that hadn’t set me up to succeed. I looked to art and creative problem solving to become my curriculum for radical survival and stepping into my identity as a young man.

I translated what my childhood had taught me about self-efficient home building quite literally when I decided to study architecture at Cooper Union in New York City. I was interested in exploring structure and material; the things that I valued the most when experienced spatially. I wanted to create environments that offered what my upbringing hadn’t; ones that were crafted to care for the inhabitant and regenerate themselves. I grew my knowledge of what it meant to create one’s own system of comfort through tangible structures during my time there, but ended up leaving still searching for a better way to fulfill my “why”.

Later that year, I found my “why”, I found quilting. I fell in love. I taught myself how to sew. I found comfort in creating the epitome of a comfort object. The architectural foundation that had been established at Cooper Union informed how I manipulated textiles and viewed woven infrastructures. It gave me the confidence to grant myself permission to experiment in ways that have been historically taboo in the world of quilting.

I initially found intrigue and success in challenging how people perceived the traditional paradigm of craft; I treated quilts as sculptures, created photo-realistic portraits out of fabric, and constructed large-scale quilts to cover external building structures. I wrote memoirs with fabric as I created collections of quilts that spoke to nostalgia, function, and identity. I explored material as I spent hours at the same thrift stores I had shopped at as a child, but this time to source materials to construct a collection of Log Cabin quilts that would go on to tour around the world.

I’m a 36 years old architect turned quilter with a love for creating tactile objects that have a history of utility and a future of self-preservation. I research comfort by creating comfort objects. I create environments through a filter of support, efficiency, and accessibility. I make fine art with a process that historically has only been identified with grandma’s and crafts, and I want to have a conversation about it.

Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way? Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
No road is smooth if you look closely enough.

I had to educate people on the value of quilts before I could sell those quilts. It’s an uphill battle to make income in the world of art.

As you know, we’re big fans of you and your work. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about what you do?
I am a quilter. I specialize in portrait and pop art quilts. I came from architecture so I think with a spatial and design mind and am really drawn to the overlap in the nostalgia of quilting and the aesthetic of architecture in textile art. I am most proud that I have been a full-time artist for 13 years supported by my work and have had the opportunity to travel the world many times to show and lecture about my work.

We’d love to hear about any fond memories you have from when you were growing up?
Water balloon fight birthday party.

Contact Info:

• Email: entropies@gmail.com
• Website: LUKE.art
• Instagram: @entropies

Image Credits
Nate Watters