CREATIVE DISCIPLINE-
Multidisciplinary Artist/Designer
PRIMARY MEDIUM(S)-
Textiles, Mixed media
ARTIST STATEMENT-
Molly Sydnor is a multidisciplinary fine artist with an eye for fiber and textile design. Treating surfaces with old and new textile techniques, she enjoys the processes driven by hand labor. Through layering and storytelling, her work is interactive, utilizing ideas of the human experience. Molly’s work is embedded with identity and body image, stimulating conversations about the complexity of gender, race, and sexuality. Influenced by not only our human anatomy and its many functions, but also how our bodies relate to ourselves and one another. Sydnor has spent the larger portion of her life explaining who she is. As a white/straight passing queer, biracial (Black) woman of color, Molly has always been told who she is, what she is not, and the identity she is or is not allowed to have. With attempts to not center herself in the black narrative, she's learned after years of imposter syndrome that blackness is not a monolith. There is no one way to be a queer black woman. The gatekeepers of blackness have decided when to let her in and when to exclude her. Ironically, its mostly non black people who have held strong on these gates. Sydnor does not fit their tokenized version of blackness when it suits them. Paralleling these experiences, Molly is also bisexual. Its jarring comparing the two as they interweave within each other. Experiencing horizontal hostility from both groups because she is a square peg and the round hole of what people perceive as gay and black doesn’t look like her. She has studied and read about other people going through similar life motions and her work is heavily influenced by this research and the way she walks through life. Where Molly used to code switch, as to assimilate to what society told her she should be, she now owns her identity which is the basis of her work. Education is a huge tool in Sydnor's work. Through storytelling, she intends to grab the attention of viewers by using fun textures and playful narratives. The use of bright colors often rainbow through her concepts hitting the LGBTQ+ layer on the head. Underlying messages of sexuality, race, and identity form through her larger concept. Utilizing space and material, she not only sets out to educate people on what queer blackness can look like, but she also has fun while doing so.
ARTIST BIOGRAPHY-
Molly Margaret Sydnor (b. 1993) is a Dallas-based multidisciplinary fine artist with an eye for fiber. She received a BFA in Fiber from the Maryland Institute College of Art in 2015, and was brought to Dallas for a career in product development specializing in rug design. Sydnor creates interactive work through storytelling and the layering of media, ideas and imagery of identity and the body. Experimentation, innovation, and play ground Sydnor’s work in her exploration of the complexities of gender, race, and sexuality. Sydnor is a biracial (black), queer identifying, woman whose self identity heavily influences her work. She was recently awarded a grant from Cedars Union for the art and equity award. Early 2020, she exhibited at The Fort Worth Community Art Center, and Sweet Tooth Hotel. In 2019, Sydnor completed a residency at Dallas’s Sunset Studios, and is currently the artist-in-residence at Burke Mercantile in LA. When she is not perfecting her studio practice, she is running a queer womans collective, working on a memoir about a biracial identity for future children questioning where they belong, and probably reading or listening to podcasts. Sometimes all four at once!
Instagram-
https://www.instagram.com/mollymargaretdesigner/?hl=en
MOLLY SYNDOR
Dallas, TX