about
Maya Skylark (Critchfield) (she/her) is a writer, textile artist, and educator living and working in Southern Maine, USA. She works with found and damaged clothing and textiles to explore care, repair, and material value. Her written work combines the rich imagery and metaphors of both textiles and the natural world to explore transformation, death, grief, and renewal.
Maya has been teaching sewing and mending workshops throughout New England since 2017. To book a workshop, please send a note through the contact page.
To stay up to date with her work and writing you can subscribe to her newsletter here.
artist statement
“My work with textiles often feels like a conversation with grief and joy. I find myself treasuring fraying fabrics with unknown origins and watching them slowly decay as I wear them or use them in my home. I have lived with a chronic illness for half of my life, and over the years I have felt so much grief and shame surrounding the limitations I come up against because of it. But when I take the time to repair my clothes in the face of decay, I embrace the fragility and ephemerality of their existence, and by doing so, confront, reflect upon, and accept the fragility of my own life. Caring for clothes is one of the most potent ways I take care of myself. This soft work is a way of holding space for hard things.”
NEWS
DECEMBER 1, 2022
My newest book has arrived! Learn more about it here.
NOVEMBER 10, 2022
My newest book, ‘Attention’, is going to be released later this month! In 2020 I carried a little notebook with me on my walks and recorded everything I saw, big and small. It was an unintentional grounding exercise that kept me going during one of the most difficult periods in my life. The notes are compiled from my notebook and the notes app on my phone and are separated by month, beginning in March and ending in December. Release date TBA. Sign up for my newsletter to stay updated :)
JULY 27, 2022
I’m currently booking public and private darning classes! If you have a shop and would like to host me, or are an individual who would like to book a one-on-one session, please email me through the contact page.
solo exhibitions
Artist Curated Book Display, Book Display and Solo Exhibition, Portsmouth Public Library, Portsmouth, NH 10/18
Make/Wear/Mend, Solo Exhibition, Blum Gallery College of the Atlantic | 4/16
Art of the Book, Solo Exhibition, College of the Atlantic, Bar Harbor, ME | 3/14
group exhibitions
Senescence, Group Exhibition, Hopkins Wharf Gallery, North Haven, ME 9/22
Trash and Textiles, Runway and Group Exhibition, Wrong Brain, Dover, NH 3/20
A Woman’s Place, Group Exhibition, Chocolate Church Arts Center, Bath, ME 5/18
Senior Project Group Exhibition, Blum Gallery, College of the Atlantic, Bar Harbor, ME | 5/16
Advanced Projects, Group Exhibition, College of the Atlantic, Bar Harbor, Maine 11/14
Activating Spaces, Group Exhibition, Artemis Gallery, Northeast Harbor, Maine 11/14
Carnet de Voyage, Group Exhibition, Pôle Universitaire, Vichy, FR | 4/14
publication
An Ode to Hunter’s Orange, Maine Sunday Telegram, 11/22
Blueberry Denim, Wovenutopia, Spring/Summer Issue 5, 2022
Unearthed, Wovenutopia, Spring/Summer Issue 5, 2022
Heartmender, Sewing Tutorial, PomPom Quarterly, Issue 34, Autumn 2020
Dandelions, Maine Sunday Telegram, 5/18
press
Maya teaching a darning workshop at Misha & Puff, 2022.