Carly Owens is a multidisciplinary artist based in Boulder, Colorado. Her work is often conceptually influenced by the tension between dualities: blessings and curses, lightness and darkness, dreams and nightmares. Owens studied at the Royal School of Needlework in the United Kingdom, and goldwork embroidery—the time-consuming art of embroidering with metal—lies at the core of her practice. She seeks to recontextualize this historic technique, making it wearable for today. Eyes are a recurring motif within her work. Inspired by the disembodied gaze of Victorian “lover’s eye” portraiture, her handcrafted wearable art pieces serve as a symbolic device for expressing the polaric spectrum of emotions from exaltation to anguish to melancholy.
