PATRICIA SWEETOW GALLERY takes great pleasure in congratulating John Paul Morabito and Museum Director Sarah Spinner Liska on the upcoming museum exhibition at Kent State Museum: JOHN PAUL MORABITO: Madonna dei Femminellə

(KSU Museum Press Release) The work included in this exhibition is from the series “Magnificat,” which explores the artist’s identity both as a queer person and as a Catholic Italian American. Morabito adapts the work of Italian old masters into these tapestries woven on a digital jacquard loom. In reimagining these paintings, Morabito incorporates glass beads, which evoke both the splendor of Catholicism and the sensibilities of camp.

In choosing textiles as their medium, they explore the status of the art form itself, which has historically been held in lower regard than painting. Morabito refers to these works as tapestries, using the term in a broad sense to describe textiles as artworks, rather than in the more technical definition of a weaving with discontinuous weft. In reworking these canonical images, Morabito updates them not only with garish colors but with technically sophisticated weaving techniques made visible in chevrons, zigzags and meanders. The choice of tapestry as a medium is essential in both creating the desired aesthetic, as well advocating for making visible communities who have struggled to achieve recognition and acceptance.

“It is my great pleasure to share my work with the community here at Kent State University,” Morabito said. “Our museum and textiles program have contributed to the development and excellence of the fiber arts for many decades – I am honored to be part of that legacy. The tapestries in this exhibition are situated at the edge of many borders to propose a new world. I hope to offer a space where those who have been rejected, cast aside and disavowed might find the divine grace that has been denied to them.”

In 2024, Morabito was named a United States Artists Fellow for their significant contributions to weaving and contemporary art. Morabito has exhibited at international venues, including the Zhejiang Art Museum in Hangzhou, China; the Southeastern Center for Contemporary Art, an affiliate of the North Carolina Museum of Art in Winston-Salem, North Carolina; the Des Moines Art Center in Des Moines, Iowa; the Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art in Overland Park, Kansas; the Center for Craft in Asheville, North Carolina; and the John Michael Kohler Arts Center in Sheboygan, Wisconsin.

Their work is represented in public and private collections, including the North Carolina Museum of Art in Raleigh, North Carolina, and the Musée des Maîtres et Artisans du Québec in Montréal, Canada. Morabito holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts from the Maryland Institute College of Art and a Master of Fine Arts from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Morabito is represented by Patricia Sweetow Gallery in Los Angeles.

This exhibition is sponsored by Janice Lessman-Moss. The Kent State University Museum receives operating support through a sustainability grant from the Ohio Arts Council.