I am a fiber artist from Oklahoma City. I gravitated toward traditionally feminine crafts throughout my childhood, learning to crochet from my grandmother. The close relationships I built with the women in my family through fiber arts ultimately inspired my interest in women’s history. I earned a BA in American history from Pepperdine University where I researched racial divides between Black and white women’s knitting movements in World War I. During that time, I spent a year studying at Fudan University in Shanghai, China.
Knitting is how I process my emotions, experiences, and memories. I am most inspired by the exercise of using a historically woman dominated craft to share my personal stories of being a young woman. So often, femininity is seen as a weakness. Things that are feminine are less valued and less important. My goal is to use my traditionally feminine skills to celebrate these small, overlooked, seemingly silly moments of young womanhood in fine art. Each piece is like my own diary entry of how sad, confusing, exhausting, freeing, and fun it feels to be 22.
I hand-knit each wearable art piece using bold colors and my own original texts. Along with knitting, I often use embroidery, crochet, hand-beading, and hand-sewing. I’m keeping the fiber art traditions passed down to me alive while using my advanced skills to write my own stories.
Shop 108 for work by Kendall Ross here!
