Susan Joy Rippberger
Folding Slips: A Ritual
Taking my slip collection of 137 full and half-slips, I fold each one gently and place it in a pile, one slip on top of the other, preparing the piles for an imaginary slip drawer where lavender sachet bags share their fragrance. Like most women, I wore slips under my dresses in the 1960s, and even into the 70s and 80s, but let them go as pants replaced dresses at work and in church. Serving as intimate apparel, nightgowns, and loungewear, slips have created a place between private and public life. Folding each slip, I commemorate its unique beauty: each a work of art, each similar to the others, yet each with charming differences in design and fabric. Once mandated for modesty, slips are rarely used anymore. But like Hester Prynne’s richly embroidered “A,” slips once took on a life of their own, showcasing the beauty and individuality of women and their choices, exemplified by the complex variety of laces, straps, styles, lengths, cuts or color, and all of soft, satiny fabrics, draping or clinging, riding up, or showing below a hemline.
About the artist
I am a visual artist living in Brooklyn. My work as artist researcher explores social theory, cultural studies, performance and textiles. I have published in academic and cultural journals on the intersection of immigration and education. I have an MFA in New Genres and a Ph.D. in International Education and Policy Studies. My performances have been presented at the Mission Arts and Performance Project of San Francisco. I have performed with slips in window pop-up galleries for the Inside-Out Project at the historic Adobe Bookshop in San Francisco’s Mission District. Most recently, I performed in San Jose, CA; Brooklyn, and Long Island City, in New York.
Photos: Nicolás Dumit Estévez Raful
Folding Slips: A Ritual
Taking my slip collection of 137 full and half-slips, I fold each one gently and place it in a pile, one slip on top of the other, preparing the piles for an imaginary slip drawer where lavender sachet bags share their fragrance. Like most women, I wore slips under my dresses in the 1960s, and even into the 70s and 80s, but let them go as pants replaced dresses at work and in church. Serving as intimate apparel, nightgowns, and loungewear, slips have created a place between private and public life. Folding each slip, I commemorate its unique beauty: each a work of art, each similar to the others, yet each with charming differences in design and fabric. Once mandated for modesty, slips are rarely used anymore. But like Hester Prynne’s richly embroidered “A,” slips once took on a life of their own, showcasing the beauty and individuality of women and their choices, exemplified by the complex variety of laces, straps, styles, lengths, cuts or color, and all of soft, satiny fabrics, draping or clinging, riding up, or showing below a hemline.
About the artist
I am a visual artist living in Brooklyn. My work as artist researcher explores social theory, cultural studies, performance and textiles. I have published in academic and cultural journals on the intersection of immigration and education. I have an MFA in New Genres and a Ph.D. in International Education and Policy Studies. My performances have been presented at the Mission Arts and Performance Project of San Francisco. I have performed with slips in window pop-up galleries for the Inside-Out Project at the historic Adobe Bookshop in San Francisco’s Mission District. Most recently, I performed in San Jose, CA; Brooklyn, and Long Island City, in New York.
Photos: Nicolás Dumit Estévez Raful