In her latest body of work, *Second Sleep*, artist Maria Britton navigates the fluid boundary between painting and sculpture using an unconventional yet intimate medium: discarded bedsheets. These "Draperies," as she calls them, are not merely hung; they are expertly layered, pleated, and manipulated into abstract forms that mimic the architectural presence of curtains while maintaining the tactile vulnerability of domestic linen.
The title of the exhibition refers to a historical phenomenon largely erased by the Industrial Revolution. Before the ubiquity of artificial light, human rest was often divided into two distinct periods—a "first sleep" followed by a few hours of wakefulness, and then a "second sleep." This midnight interval was a liminal space used for prayer, creative reflection, or quiet domestic chores. Britton’s work seeks to reclaim this lost rhythm, positioning her textiles as portals into a time when the boundaries between productivity and rest were more porous.
By repurposing materials that have reached the end of their traditional utility, Britton engages with broader questions of labor, gender, and the perceived value of the domestic. The sheets, once sites of intimacy and exhaustion, are reinvented through a process that prioritizes slow, deliberate craftsmanship over the frenetic pace of modern production. In doing so, Britton invites a reflection on what has been sacrificed to the pressures of modern efficiency and what might be recovered in the folds of the past.
With reporting from Hyperallergic.
Source · Hyperallergic
