Stamps for Embroidery c. 1937

Charlotte Angus’s "Stamps for Embroidery" presents a series of early American embroidery stamp designs laid out on paper, with a charming naivety. The stamps are rendered in simple colors with their corresponding impressions sketched around them. You can see that she’s not just copying; she’s thinking through the process. The texture is flat, giving the piece a graphic quality, but the shadowing on the wooden blocks hints at three-dimensionality. The artist’s hand is evident. The variations in the sketched lines around the block prints, give them life and character, they are like little doodles in a sketchbook. Look at the top left of the print, with its simple, almost childlike strokes that echo the stamp designs but with an unrefined quality that is quite striking. This piece reminds me a little of some of the work of Ree Morton, with her playful approach to materials and her interest in vernacular forms. Like Morton, Angus embraces a kind of happy awkwardness, and it's really wonderful.