
3 Diagonales Noires
2000
Three bold diagonal lines of black embroidered thread cut across the canvas, creating a striking tension between the delicate, traditionally feminine craft of needlework and the assertive, gestural mark-making associated with abstract painting. Amer layers acrylic and gel medium beneath and around the embroidery, blurring the boundary between painting and textile art. This work exemplifies her signature exploration of gender, desire, and the politics of women's labor through the subversive fusion of fine art and domestic craft traditions.
- Medium
- acrylic, embroidery and gel medium on canvas
- Dimensions
- Location
- Phillips, Salt Lake City, UT
- Spotted At
- Auction House · PhillipsView on map
Notes
Execution: Executed in 2000. Exhibition History: Spain, Valencià Institut d'Art Modern,
🔨 Auction Lot
Modern & Contemporary Art
February 28, 2026
Estimate: $15,000 to $20,000
Sold: $15,480
Lot 113
More by Ghada Amer
Spotted works by Ghada Amer
Artists in conversation

Rosemarie Trockel
German · b. 1952

Trockel similarly subverts the hierarchy between fine art and domestic craft by incorporating knitted and woven textiles into conceptual artworks that challenge gender politics and the gendering of labor. Her machine knitted canvases share Amer's strategy of using traditionally feminine textile techniques within the formal language of abstract painting.

Louise Bourgeois
French American · b. 1911

Bourgeois powerfully fused sewing, embroidery, and fabric with fine art practice to explore feminist themes around the female body, desire, and domestic labor, directly paralleling Amer's subversive reclamation of needlework. Both artists deploy textile materials with an assertive psychological intensity that challenges conventional boundaries between craft and high art.
Elaine Reichek
American · b. 1943
Reichek uses hand embroidery on canvas to critique the historical marginalization of needlework as a feminine domestic art form, making her practice conceptually and materially closest to Amer's approach in this specific piece. Her works similarly place embroidered thread in dialogue with painting conventions to interrogate gender and cultural representation.

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