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Akers, Adela [1933-. Spain/USA. Weaver]

 

Adela Akers was born in Santiago de Compostela, Spain in 1933 and raised in Havana, Cuba (1939-57). She studied pharmacy at the University of Havana in Cuba, from where she graduated in 1955 and then worked as a biochemist. She subsequently became interested in weaving and textile art, and at the age of 24 moved to the USA and studied fibre art at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in Chicago, Illinois (1957-60); and at Cranbrook Academy of Art in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan (1960-61, 1962-63). She then returned to Chicago.

During the early 1960s she began gaining recognition for her work nationally and in 1962 was selected for the ‘Young Americans’ exhibition. In 1965 she went to Peru as a weaving advisor to the Alliance for Progress and later organised a cottage industry in Yucatán.

Between 1968-70 she was weaver-in-residence at Penland School of Crafts in Penland, North Carolina. In 1970 she moved to Clinton, New Jersey, where she set up a studio near Toshiko Takaezu (1922-). She also taught classes at The New School and Cooper Square Art Center in New York City. She received a grant from the New Jersey State Council on the Arts to execute ‘Ceremonial Wall’ (1972), the first such grant to a weaver.

From 1972 to 1995 Akers taught at Tyler School of Art, Temple University University in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, where she was Professor and Chair of Fiber Arts, and is currently Professor Emeritus. After retiring from Temple University she moved with her husband to Northern California.

Solo exhibitions of Akers’ work have been held at Chicago Central Library in Chicago, Illinois (1966); Fiberworks, Center for the Textile Arts in Berkeley, California (1980); and at Philadelphia Academy of Fine Arts in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (1986). Shehas also participated in many group exhibitions from the 1960s onwards including ‘Young Americans 1962’ at the Museum of Contemporary Crafts [now Museum of Arts and Design] in New York City (1962); ‘Objects: USA’ at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, DC (1969, toured 1969-72); ‘8 Artists’ at Philadelphia Museum of Art in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (1978); ‘Fiber: Thread and Cloth Forms’ at Dayton Art Institute in Dayton, Ohio (1981); ‘Filaments of the Imagination’ at Manoa Art Gallery in Honolulu, Hawaii (1981); ‘Jacquard Textiles’ at the Museum of Art, Rhode Island School of Design in Providence, Rhode Island (1982, later toured); and ‘Craft Today: Poetry of the Physical’ at the American Craft Museum [now Museum of Arts and Design] in New York City (1986-87, toured 1987-88).

In 2008 Akers was elected to the American Craft Council College of Fellows. Other honours and awards she has received included National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) grants and fellowships (1969, 1971, 1974, 1980); the New Jersey State Council of the Arts grant (1971); the Pennsylvania Council of the Arts grant (1983); and the Aileen Osborn Webb Award from the American Craft Council (2009).

Examples of Akers’ work are in the permanent collections of the Renwick Gallery, Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, DC; the Museum of Arts and Design in New York City; the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City; and Everson Museum of Art in Syracuse, New York.

Akers was interviewed by Mija Riedel in 2008 for the Smithsonian Institution Archives of American Art Oral History Program. Her papers for the years 1968-91 are held at the Smithsonian Institution Archives of American Art in Washington, DC.

Bibliography

1. Adela Akers: recent works. Philadelphia: Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, 1986 [Exhibition catalogue]

 2. Nordness, Lee. Objects: USA New York, NY: Viking Press, 1970
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