Cold Comfort

Mia Cinelli
2025

In the age of American Oligarchy, this soft sculpture is a visual representation of "screaming into the void."

Cold Comfort, 2025, ~12 x 48”

thrifted scrap fabric, remnants from various projects and mask-making, fringe from my late grandmother, cotton thread, acrylic yarn, persistent existential dread

In times of deep uncertainty, we reach for comfort. We revel in the ideal aspirations of kitsch, the soft landing of a handmade blanket, the saccharine distractions which stave off reality, if only temporarily.

Recontextualizing the visual language of cozy domestic objects, this over-the-top quilt conveys absurdity and dismay simultaneously. Not quite large enough to be functional and not small enough to be avoidable, this quilted text maps an initially reassuring — but ultimately disappointing— message. It is cold comfort only; when the knowledge you were right is little solace.

artist/designer
Mia Cinelli