HAPPY PORTRAIT MONDAY

Mike Macri, Gump Worsley
needlepoint, 2010
image courtesy of Mike Macri

Happy Portrait Monday!

This week's Portrait Monday is brought to you by the Winsor Gallery intern, Alex Quicho, and local artist, Mike Macri.

With hockey season right around the corner, Mike Macri's hockey needlepoint works are too charming to resist. Their colours recall vintage photographs, and indeed, this series of cross-stitched NHL goalies encapsulates an era past -- the seasons of 1967-70, to be exact. A true labour of love, each work took approximately 80-100 hours to complete, and cleverly but earnestly juxtaposes the traditionally male-centric world of sport franchises with a traditionally "female" craft practice. More than just its concept, however, the thing I like most about Macri's work is how it is critically on-point (no pun intended), humble, and heartwarming at once.

If you like what you see, you can check out the rest of Macri's hockey portraits here.