Lost Weavings

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Graffin’s work consisted of cascading strips of red, woven polyester fabric especially commissioned for the project. These were affixed at several points to curved brass rings that echoed the rotational geometry of Portman’s design.

The Marriott hanging reflected Graffin’s longstanding interest in exploring four interrelated concepts: breath, tension, gravity, and movement. The work began with six trapezoidal elements forming a canopy directly over the atrium bar. A set of parallel fabric bands then rose from either side of the canopy, rejoining at a large ring shaped like a mobius strip just above the hotel’s hospitality level on the thirteenth floor. From there, a single set of parallel fabric bands ascended in one direction from the mobius strip to a bow ring at floor 21, while another set rose in the opposite direction to meet at a smaller bow ring at floor 31. The final section ascended as a group of bands forming a single curve across the entire space, ending at a circular brass ring at the top of the atrium at floor 45. While Graffin’s hanging echoed Portman’s atrium design, its asymmetrical arrangement, kinetic movement, and staggered focal points also broke up the architecture’s repetitiveness.

Graffin’s commission fell victim to a 2007 renovation of the Marriott Marquis atrium. An article in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (AJC) detailing the hotel’s makeover included a jokey observation that hotel guests would no longer be able to launch paper airplanes and other detritus at “the world’s largest target.” The article also included a misattribution, referring to Graffin’s hanging as “The Kite” and crediting it to Christo, “the artist who installed the saffron gates in New York's Central Park in February 2005.” The error angered Atlanta-based curator Dorothy (Dot) Moye, who insisted the AJC print a correction, which it did.

Helena Hernmarck (b. 1941) designed two tapestries for the Bank of America Plaza (formerly NationsBank Plaza), located on North Avenue between Peachtree and West Peachtree Streets. The building was designed by Kevin Roche of the Connecticut-based architectural firm Kevin Roche John Dinkeloo and Associates, with developer Tom Cousins of Cousins Properties and Bennett Brown of C & S Sovran Bank. Completed in 1992, it is notable in the Atlanta skyline for its Art Deco-inspired façade—recalling New York's Empire State Building and the Chrysler Building—as well as its open-lattice pyramid surmounted by a gilded spire.

Born in Sweden, Hernmarck is celebrated for her extraordinary talent in weaving large-scale, trompe l'oeil tapestries. Working closely with architectural and commercial clients, she developed designs that worked well in large spaces and provided a subtle but effective form of corporate branding. Hernmarck studied textiles in Sweden under the mentorship of three women: Alice Lund, Edna Martin, and Astrid Sampe. Following her graduation from the University College of Arts, Crafts, and Design in her native Stockholm in 1963, she relocated to Canada and then England before eventually moving to the United States in the mid-1970s. Presently, she maintains a studio in Connecticut.

Hernmarck completed five tapestries for clients in Atlanta, all woven in rya wool and linen, with assistance from Alice Lund Textilier in Borlänge, Sweden. She acquires most of her wool from Wålstedts Textilverkstad, a family-run spinning and dyeing mill in Dala-Floda, Sweden. Maintaining these connections to Sweden's textile traditions has been an essential aspect of Hernmarck’s career. Her inventive weaving technique, which combines tabby, rölaken, hand-manipulated overshot, and soumak, is known by the Swedish term bildvävnader or “wall picture weaving." The variation allows her to execute complex designs that convey an illusionistic sense of depth and volume. At the same time, Hernmarck’s technique does not produce hard lines, so the work reads well from any viewing distance.

Springtime was installed in the lobby's seating area, facing a window overlooking a small, urban green space. It depicts a deep wooded landscape with a burst of red and pink azaleas in the foreground. Hernmarck based the image on a photograph she took at Georgia’s Callaway Gardens. Located near Pine Mountain, the garden is known for its native plumleaf azaleas. Hernmarck spent three days photographing the gardens in order to secure an optimal composition.

Once Hernmarck decided on her tapestry design, she traveled to Sweden to work with dyers and spinners to match the colors to the photograph. Her works often include threads of different textures and colors to match the tones in the photograph as closely as possible.

Currency (originally titled Money) hung in a branch bank inside the main lobby. Responding to Atlanta’s emergence as an international banking city, the weaving features an image of paper money from countries worldwide, each banknote bearing signs of having been repeatedly handled. Their colors range from grays and greens to pinks and reds that complement the reds and blacks of the surrounding marble and granite architecture.

One Ninety-One Peachtree Tower is a postmodern office space designed by John Burgee Architects with Philip Johnson as a design consultant. Johnson commissioned Hernmarck to create this piece in 1990 after she visited his firm a few years prior. She was originally going to weave an image of a Phoenix for this commission. It’s the symbol for Atlanta rising from the ashes in 1864 after it was burned to the ground in 1864 during the US Civil War and again during the Great Atlanta Fire of 1917. She changed her mind after a visit to the Atlanta Historical Society, where she saw the historic Swan House, designed in 1928 by Atlanta architect Philip Trammel Schutze. She took a photograph of the sun streaming across an Italianate style urn decorating its exterior. For her tapestry, Hernmarck placed the urn in an arched niche above a bed of large tulips. Like the Phoenix, the choice of the urn speaks to Atlanta history rather than to a specific business. However, the inclusion in her tapestry of the large pink tulips was also a nod to the Dutch investment firm that was the building’s majority owner and developer at the time of construction.

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Georgia artist Ken Weaver (b. 1943) completed several fiber art commissions in Atlanta and throughout the United States. He developed an interest in weaving as an architecture student at Auburn University. The first tapestry he wove was included in a 1966 exhibition at the Atlanta Arts Association, which eventually became the High Museum of Art. Upon graduation, Weaver apprenticed in Jack Lenor Larsen's New York studio for several months, working with Win Anderson to develop wax-resist batik techniques. This experience solidified his transition from architectural design to textile studies. Weaver went on to earn an MFA in 1969 from Cranbrook Academy of Art.

After teaching briefly at Auburn University, Weaver returned to Georgia in 1971 and became an assistant professor at the University of Georgia (UGA). He participated in local and national exhibitions, including the High Museum's annual "Georgia Artists Exhibit" (1971, 1972, 1974). Weaver is one of the few fiber artists of this era to have a work in the High’s permanent collection. He also sold his work through two Atlanta galleries, Blanche Reeves' Signature Shop and Gallery Illien, owned by Anna Belle Illien.

Weaver left UGA permanently in 1975 as demand for his commissioned work increased. He continued to pursue large-scale weaving commissions into the 1980s but grew increasingly tired of the process. The extensive planning and the need to meet specific client demands eventually wore on him. By the mid-1980s, Weaver stopped making large-scale work altogether as opportunities for corporate commissions began to slack off.

Olga de Amaral's two weavings, Cesta lunar (Moon Basket) 49 and 50 (1991), once resided in the lobby of Concourse Corporate Center V. The building forms part of a mixed-use commercial complex, The Concourse at Landmark Center, situated at the northeast corner of the intersection of Interstate 285 and Georgia 400 in Sandy Springs in metro Atlanta, and designed by the architectural firm Thompson, Ventulett, Stainback & Associates. Concourse Corporate Centers V and VI, completed in 1988 and 1991, are known locally as "the King and Queen Towers” due to their striking white lattice crowns.

Amaral’s 23’ tall weavings of linen, gesso, acrylic, platinum, and gold leaf were commissioned for the Landmark Group through Louise Allrich. As the owner of Allrich Gallery in San Francisco, Louise was influential in promoting contemporary textile art. Amaral’s technique was inspired by the compact basketry of the Yanomami people living in the Amazonian rainforest of Venezuela and Brazil. Her plaiting recalls the elemental construction of their baskets, while the titles of her works allude to the moon's role in the Yanomami origin story. Amaral's familiarity with pre-Colombian art and colonial Catholic objects influenced her interest in gold. The artist also credits her use of the material to Lucie Rie, a British ceramic artist she met in 1970 who practiced kintsugi, the Japanese art of repairing broken pottery with gold. Unlike the dense sculptural quality of El gran muro, the Cesta lunar weavings prioritize shimmering surface effects. Amaral used linen rather than wool and horsehair substrate for the gesso, acrylic paint, and precious metals, producing a faceted effect that recalls jewelry and basketry. Along with the gold, Amaral diagonally interwove thin strips of linen gilded in platinum. A closer look at Amaral’s weavings also reveals the presence of additional colors, predominantly blues toward the top and reds toward the bottom, which along with the gold, may invoke the colors of the Colombian flag.

The King and Queen Towers acquired new owners in 2012, and in 2016, Cesta lunar 49 and 50 were sold through auction to private collectors. The owner of Cesta lunar 50 contacted Amaral in 2017 about its restoration. The artist recommended dividing the large weaving into two independent artworks, and the owner agreed. Cesta lunar 50B was included in the traveling exhibition Olga de Amaral: To Weave a Rock organized by the Museum of Fine Arts Houston (July 25–September 19, 2021) and the Cranbrook Art Museum (October 30, 2021 - March 27, 2022). Cesta lunar 49 currently remains in a private collection.