Historically, cross-stitch had a relational function. The girlish virtues it boasted attracted potential suitors, ‘love’ matches.  

Subtracting text from existing samplers, a process that’s like erasure poetry, transforms long, drawn-out verse into short instances of speech. The remaining text—sweet nothings, passionate ramblings, and lovelorn pleas—asserts an explicit love affair upon the traditional marital practices cross-stitch subtly upholds, reinterpreting a dismissed form of feminine expression.

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“Grey Eckert utilizes the historically feminine—and overlooked—art of embroidery to conjure up and recast the past.” (New Visionary Magazine, Issue 7)

“The resulting work is not only an elevation of an artform that isn’t often given its due; it’s the reclamation and liberation of a traditional, restrictive expressive mode. The bursts of language Eckert embroiders brim with tender feeling and innuendo, gently asserting their agency.” (New Visionary Magazine, Issue 7)