Interview with morgan bukovec
Morgan Bukovec
An Interview About Her Stitch Industry Project
interview conducted by Patrick Duggan
photography courtesy of Morgan Bukovec
published in Issue Five
Storytelling is held sacred to those who understand its value, discipline and potential. These days it is rare to hear the term applied to a project that feels its full-bodied worth and not just another hollow marketing campaign. When it comes to Morgan Bukovec, her stories are a welcomed punch-in-the-face as they are a tonic. No script. No three-act structure. She tells her stories through everyday found objects and the ephemeral words that are casually directed her way. Often in the environment of the mundane and the overlooked. This is where her art is given life. We interviewed her about a project that is years in the making and only getting started. This is her stitch industry project, also titled “are you on the menu?”
What is the creation story for your collection?
I have been working in the service industry for over ten years. I was really focused on serving and bartending the last three years to make money as a side gig. In the service industry – well, for the majority of my life – but particularly the service industry, I was noticing how my customers, mainly my male customers, how they would talk to me. In terms of name calling, some questions they would ask, things that would make me feel uncomfortable that were totally inappropriate. I noticed this just being such a norm.
I would go into work and these things continue daily, and I never went into it thinking it was an art project. It was just something I was experiencing day in and day out. But it wasn’t until I met with one of my old art professors from college. She brought up this idea of how artists often have side hustles, these other jobs and how we can use these as life experience to fuel new work. So I kept thinking about what that meant and just had the idea of documenting these words. Again, not really thinking about it as a visual product or what this art thing would look like. But really just to document.
So I would go into work and hear these names, these questions and these things my male customers would say to me and I just started writing them down. Whether it was on a piece of paper or my guest check pad. Then after my shift or on break, I would type them into my phone. But I got really adamant about just documenting. That happened for a few years, that I was just documenting these words. This whole process of documenting just felt like reclamation. Just reclaiming these words and taking ownership over them, kind of in a secret and personal way. After accumulating more and more, I just got this sense of like “Wow, this is a lot of content. How would this be a visual? How would I talk about this?”
As an artist who primarily works in collage, installation, and textiles, I questioned how these words would come into play. I thought about it as a collage, but that just didn’t feel right. So I let these questions just sit with me for a while. Until I came across the process of cross-stitch. It was an artist on Instagram I follow. I just thought that looks really cool and old-school, so I decided to just DM the artist and learn how to cross-stitch. I’ve never done it before, but it seemed really neat.
She sent me the letter guide, and then I was thinking what do I cross stitch these on? I would always bring home the guest check books from work, because I’m a collector of things, as a collage artist I am always just collecting different things. I would bring home these guest check books and figured I’ll practice on these, I’ll start with a single word, and that was the word “baby.” I stitched it right on there. I left the threads hanging off their back. It wasn’t perfect, there were rips and tears. But when I looked at that work it just clicked, and I thought in my head “I am going to make one-hundred of these.” And two years later, I finally completed my goal.
It all started with a baby.
Yeah, it really did. It was born!
When you’re in that process of just documenting everything, did you feel like you started to notice more than you normally would? Do you feel like you got more of an ear for it?
I’d say absolutely. My sense of awareness is already pretty keen when interacting with strangers. That applies to positive experiences too. My collage projects involve hearing people’s stories. You’ll have very beautiful and lovely interactions with strangers. I still love interacting with strangers, that’s part of the reason why I like working in the service industry as well. But yes, the moment that I started documenting, that click of awareness, it felt like a motivator. Like, okay, I’m going to work but I’m also working on this secret project. It felt good to have a motivator. When I have an uncomfortable interaction, like when someone orders a burger with a side, like “I’ll have a side of you”, like WHAT?! What are you saying? Just really ridiculous things like “I want to rub mayo on you,” like what the heck? And they do make you laugh because it’s so ridiculous and uncomfortable but it did make me feel like, not excited, but I was determined to get things written down.
A common theme in your other interviews and your artist statement is how you like to capture things in life that are fleeting. Did that come to you as you were creating this cross-stitch and how you’re adding this permanent element to these fleeting comments that were said to you?
I appreciate that connection. I am drawn to fleeting moments and lost objects across time. For example, in a lot of my collages, I find objects like candy wrappers, things on the ground, things that someone would discard and walk past or throw away. I really appreciate that you brought up this connection of these words and interactions with my male customers as fleeting moments of time and capturing that and bringing them into these permanent fixtures.
I honestly had not made that connection myself but it makes sense for my practice of work. I think that’s an interesting thing too, this capturing of things and making them permanent. Even bringing up this idea of “inspection.” Part of the metaphor that I talk about with the series, is when you inspect the work with a close eye you can see these imperfections. With the loose thread and the tears. You can see this really thick buildup where some of the threads are very messy in the back upon inspection. It’s all a part of the continual reflection of these fleeting moments when you add that level of permanence.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but the one-hundred works started out as words that you experienced and then you opened it up to the other people in the service industry to share their own experience?
So all of the works from the one-hundred “are you on the menu?” are words that were directed to me, and from my experience. All of the words really reflect my inner personal experience. All these words I have heard while working my in-person service job. I did start posting about folks messaging me their own stories that stemmed from me posting about the artwork. Something I did not expect whatsoever, was that my DMs became flooded with a lot of people I did not personally know, but they saw the connection of the work. They saw it was about the service industry and they started messaging me their stories. So I started the page:
so folks could submit their stories and I would repost them anonymously. I do think there’s power in storytelling. I know this artwork series is just about my own very vulnerable story, but having gone really deep and vulnerable with myself, that being its own healing journey making the series, just sharing it has allowed others to recount their own experience. Whether they’re a witness to a loved one’s story or sharing their own experience. I do think that was an unexpected thing to happen with the work that I was not prepared for at all. But it did give space for a community of people to just share and put those stories out there into the world. There’s definitely power in that, power in numbers. That’s been a really wonderful thing for folks to share their stories and have that affirmation of “I hear you, I see you.”
I had my solo show at Kaiser Gallery in Cleveland in November and a huge part of that show for me was to create a wall that was just a “share your story” wall. Just because of how powerful that response has been to the work. To give people in the gallery the opportunity to share their own story. On papers, on guest check papers, and pin their stories to the wall. At the end of the exhibition, I had a performance piece where I went in and read all of the stories to the crowd. As I read them aloud, I connected them with thread to create a visual element to symbolize an affirmation of “I hear you, I see you.”
And it’s a part of this larger story of the sexual harassment in the service industry and really to just the power of words in our lives.
In my last interview, [Joy Melan], the idea of starting a service industry podcast was kicked around, it sounds like something you should defintley jump into.
That’s awesome. Very cool. For me, my own experience in this service industry has been conflicting in many ways. Unfortunately, there has been trauma setting in from these personal experiences including flightiness and uneasy relationships with unfamiliar men. There has been a lot of things I’ve personally dealt with. Even my own response to hearing the words has varied, you know? I think that’s such a huge part of it. Building community around the service industry and talking about interactions with customers is important. Definitely connect with me about that, I would love to tell some stories. A lot of the stories did not make the guest check books because they were way too long [laughs].
What has the feedback been from this project?
I had some of this work in a gallery in Atlanta and the curator of the show wrote a commentary calling it “sad.” When I read that I felt kind of strange about it. Because of how I felt about this work in such a powerhouse way of like “I’m reclaiming these words.” My mom had that similar reaction of “You have experienced this? This is horrible.” My brother mentioned it to me when I was telling him about this project. “I knew you worked at a restaurant/bar, but I had no idea you experienced this every time you worked. It didn’t even cross my mind.” It made him more aware when he’s at a bar or when men talk to the bartenders or even talking to women in general. That feedback has been interesting, just hearing people close to me and my loved ones, what they have experienced. I mean, my dad, living with my parents while I made this work. They’d be like “What are you making? Which one is it today?” and I’d say something like “Tight ass” or “Do your tits sag?” and they’re like “OK, alright.”
It’s an uncomfortable thing right? So, with all the loved ones, it’s been an interesting thing to navigate and share this experience. I think it’s been really good though too, because I’ve been able to share this experience. Like, yes this has happened, but then with the solo show in November, having the one-hundred artworks on the wall, along with creating other installations that correlated with this work and even including a special video project with my dad. Sharing this experience, creating these works - it’s all been worth it.
There were some men I talked with in the gallery space saying I should reach out to PBS and pursue a documentary with this, so PBS if you’re out there…
Oh, they’re out there.
They’re out there, somewhere. The feedback has been very supportive and positive. And just me having to be prepared to talk about this experience more because of this artwork thing out there. There was some shock when people found out that all of these words have been said to me. When I say that to people there is always a level of shock. But the feedback overall has been very supportive and positive.
That’s incredible. It’s a testament to how you go about your work and this project. It’s not easy, not only to dive into your own vulnerability for an artistic piece but then realize “Oh, I have to talk about this every time it gets promoted.”
[laughs] That is true. It reminds me of one of my art mentors who said to me, “The more vulnerable you get with your work, the deeper you get with your work. The more universal it becomes.” I thought about that when it comes to this project. This is the most vulnerable series I’ve ever created to date and in turn it has been such a universal experience that folks have been able to connect with.
I want to talk about the actual work itself. As you said cross-stitching was a new skill for you. What was the environment you created in? Was it always changing? Did it require a certain headspace?
So, I brought these with me everywhere I went. When I was traveling, I’d bring a little pencil case with my guest checkbooks, needle & thread inside. I’d stitch in airports, on trains, planes, buses, and trams. When I lived in Europe, I stitched. When I moved back to Ohio, I stitched. I was always stitching away. I was also deadline focused, I knew I wanted to complete one hundred. I was slowly stitching here and there. I would submit three works to a gallery and they’d be accepted so I would remind myself “Ok I gotta get these one hundred works done.” It felt motivating.
In the last few years it definitely made some headway into the public eye. I’d be sitting on airplanes next to people and they’d say “What the heck is she doing?” I honestly commend people for asking me “What the heck are you doing?” It’s true, I mean I’d be stitching “sugar tits” onto a checkbook or “flash me” or “hot pants.” What is going on here? Those opportunities were also very vulnerable right? I’d have to be like “I’m an artist, I’m working on this project.” and put my headphones on and continue to work.
But I appreciate you bringing that part of the process up, because each letter took me about ten minutes to stitch. I did the calculations on this [laughs]. Each guest check book, depending on the length of the word, it would take me about 2-8 hours to complete one. So that over the course of the 2 years... I’ve spent a lot of time stitching these works, which reflects the metaphor of investing my time and energy into processing and healing through the experience of working in the service industry for over a decade. This is all a part of my reclamation. The actual act of stitching takes such a long time and reflects my long journey of healing. The repeated motion of stitching into paper, the repeated motion, with repeated words goes back into that idea of microaggressions. Something that builds and builds over time. An art collector even brought up to me “The ‘X’ - that’s symbolic too, like “Oh that X, that cross, what does that stand for?” There are so many layers to it. But yeah these guest checkbooks have traveled the world!
Put yourself in this situation, it’s you and your clone. Someone you know is holding a gun with one bullet to kill the clone. What do you do to prove in that situation that you are the real Morgan?
I’d say if the person asked us to, I would have to do something of a childhood passion. If they asked what was my strangest collection of things? Gosh, I have so many. Like, I collect all the thrift tags from Goodwill and thrift stores, birth control tabs, and snow globes. I feel like my clone would know I’m a collector of things but have no idea of what I’m collecting.
You know what I would ask? I’d hand both of you guest check books and say “Stitch away!”
But they’d see my instagram videos and know exactly what to stitch.
But theirs would be “perfect”, and yours would have very organic and human errors that make them your style.
You see? This ties all back to the Stitch Service Industry Project. I would be making these wonky stichings, imperfect designs. My AI clone would not stand a chance.
