I recently visited Ulverston and The Shop Floor Project. I was as fascinated by the shop, situated on the central Market Street, as I was the captivating, quirky website. The site is presented as a shop front, and the looking and shopping experience is fun and intriguing as you click on each category to reveal creatively presented and unique products. The Project was founded by mother and daughter duo, Denise and Samantha Allan. Both professional artists and curators, they see the Project as ‘a series of curated spaces filled with objects that fulfill their main criteria; that the object is worthy of keeping and passing down through generations – be it…
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Light and Line
Above image: One o’clock, Anne Morrell, 2008. 59.5 x 66 cm. Photographer: Michael Pollard As I entered the Light and Line exhibition at the Nottingham Castle gallery, I felt as if I was entering a space of calm and serenity, partly due to the peace and quiet of the gallery – a welcome change to the bustle of so many in London. But, it was more significantly the calm, stillness, serenity and beauty of nature and the landscape that both artists Polly Binns and Anne Morrell have captured in their work that emphasised this feeling. Anne Morrell Anne Morrell’s inspiration for her work draws upon an instilled connection to her childhood…
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Kanga – communicating cloths
A recent exhibition at the British museum displayed and documented a rich Africa textile tradition. In a previous blog post, I wrote about an exhibition and symposium entitled ‘Social Fabric‘ in which fabric was used as a metaphor for society, and often a symbol of colonial power. On the other hand, the recent exhibition at the British Museum – Social Fabric: African textiles today displays cloths that directly and graphically express the wearer’s political, social, religious, sexual and emotional views and concerns. The textiles on display were kangas – textiles I recognised but knew very little about. I immediately remembered a picture I had cut out of the Guardian, of Masai…
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Asia House Fair – a review
One thing amongst many others that I love about living in London, especially during a long period of no travelling, is that I get to have little experiences of India and tasters of lots more countries that I haven’t been to. These tasters allow me to reminisce about travels or plan for further exciting travels to new far flung countries. While many good restaurants serve delicious authentic Indian food, particularly good thalis and street food – such as Dishoom in Covent Garden and Govinda’s in Soho, I am talking of course more of the taste for the aesthetic, visual and textural – textiles. And last weekend I received a good…
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Wool House at Somerset House
As I sit looking out at the miserable grey sky and snow coming down horizontally, almost blizzard like, I wish I could be sitting cosily in the ‘mammoth chair’ or in one of the rooms decorated completely using wool in the Wool House exhibition at Somerset House. The exhibition was curated and styled by Arabella McNie for The Campaign for Wool. The campaign was launched in 2010 by Patron HRH The Prince of Wales to ‘unite the international textile industry to promote real wool as the superior natural and sustainable fibre for fashion, interiors and the built environment’ (exhibition leaflet). On entering the expansive and impressive courtyard of Somerset House,…
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World Eco-Fiber and Textile (WEFT) Art at the Brunei Gallery
The current exhibition at the Brunei Gallery at SOAS (the School of Oriental and African Studies), is a huge, comprehensive exhibition displaying textiles from various countries all over the world that have a rich tradition in textile making, particularly using natural fibres and dyes. The World Eco-Fiber and Textile Art, aptly abbreviated to WEFT – exhibition covers hand-woven textiles, hand-painted and printed textiles, hand painted/embellished bark, dyed textiles, hand-made felt, hand embroidered textiles, fiber and textile jewellery and ‘contemporary expressions’. The exhibition was curated by Malaysian architect-designer Edric Ong, president of the Society Atelier Sarawak Malaysia. It was interesting to see that most individual artists who created the works on display were…
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Oxford’s cultural and historical treasures
The city of Oxford may be small but the historic walls and buildings hold a wealth of history and culture within. I unfortunately just missed two interesting looking exhibitions when I visited – the ‘Made for Trade’ at the Pitt Rivers Museum and Threads of Silk and Gold at the Ashmolean. Bad planning on my part seeing as I don’t live far away and they’ve been on for ages! Nevertheless, there was enough to see at both of these museums as well as the Bodleian library. First stop was the Ashmolean Museum, a must for anybody researching Indian block printed textiles or the Middle Age Indian Ocean trade because…
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Exhibitions and Fairs – Reviews and Roundup
Selvedge Winter Fair I went along to the Selvedge Winter Fair on Saturday. It was the first time I’ve managed to get along to the internationally renowned magazine’s annual fair of beautiful textiles mostly hand-made in the UK, or collected from around the world. When I first arrived about 12 noon, the hall was packed out and at times even became difficult to see any of the textiles on display. I slunk off to the side hall-ways where I chatted to Neha who was representing the non-profit organisation Women Weave in Maheshwar, India. It was founded by Sally Holkar in 2003 following a successful growth of the Rehwa Society formed by…
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A little bit of Kachchh in Manchester
An exchange project organised by A Fine Line involved two artists Lokesh Ghai, textile artist and graduate of National institute of Fashion Technology in Ahmedabad, and teacher at Kala Raksha in Kachchh, and Shamji Vishram, a weaver from Bhujodi, Kachchh exhibiting their work and carrying out workshops in various galleries in the North West. These included the Harris Museum, Platt Hall Gallery of Costume, Queen Street Mill in Burnley and Manchester Art Gallery. An opening at the latter gallery involved craft demonstrations, music, Gujarati food and chai, as did the closing party at Platt Hall two weeks ago. The project LOkesh worked on during the residency was inspired by Lancashire’s historic…
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A feast of pattern
Another new gallery space discovered recently – Aram Gallery on Drury Lane, Covent Garden London. It is on the top floor of a contemporary designer furniture store established by Zeev Aram in the early 1960s. Having seen the Eley Kishimoto exhibition advertised and not realising it was situated in a furniture store, it was a nice surprise to walk through three floors of exciting and beautifully designed furniture. ‘Living with Pattern’ was an apt title for this exhibition where pattern was everywhere in the space – walls, clothes, shoes, plates and vases. Walking through the space is lots of fun, with a new surprise round each corner, including a musical…
