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Textile Curator’s Contemporary Textile Art Exhibition

I’m thrilled that thirteen incredible textile artists are part of Textile Curator’s first Contemporary Fine Art Textiles Exhibition. Some artists are exhibiting more than one piece but this gives you a flavour of what to expect if you visit the exhibition. A wide range of techniques are featured including hand & machine stitch, textile sculpture, knit, weaving and quilting. Themes range from identity to pop culture, and climate change to self confidence. The artists are Caroline Burgess, Jen Cable, Jordan Cunliffe, Jenni Dutton, Sarah Geyer, Alicja Kowlowska, Deniz Kurdak, Melissa, Emerson, Lizzie Hill, Sara Impey, Lucy Newman Karen Nicole and Jane Walkley.

It is the only art gallery at The Stitch Festival at the Business Design Centre, Islington, London and runs from Thursday March 21st through to Sunday 24th March.

Check out www.stitchfestival.co.uk for opening times.

I hope you see you there!

Outi Pieski at Tatę St Ives

 

  

 

      

 

Images from the top Outi Pieski, Beavvit – Rising Together II, 2021; Portrait by Heikki Tuuli, Rástegáisa lágalaš riektesubjeaktan II Sacred Mountain Rástegáisa as a Legal Person I, 2018;  Photo Jussi Tiainen; Golleeana Land of Gold, 2013. © Ella Tommila EMMA – Espoo Museum of Modern Art; Silbajohka Silver River, 2014. Photo Jussi Tiainen; Skabmavuoddu – Spell on Me!

 

 

There is no question that galleries are increasingly featuring fine artists who use textiles as their medium. You still have to seek it out though which makes it such a rewarding experience when you visit a textile exhibition. Tate St Ives has just opened Outi Pieski’s first large-scale exhibition in the UK. I haven’t seen Outi’s work before and to see it together in such a beautiful environment made it even more special. Her art is not only visually astounding but has so much to say.

 

Outi is an artist and an activist. Much of her work revolves around the environment and inhabitants of her homeland of Sapmi. This is an area in the Arctic Circle divided between Norway, Sweden, Finland and Russia where the Indigenous Sami have lived for hundreds of years. Outi’s work explores issues including elements of Sami culture that have been lost, and highlights how developments, proposed or otherwise, impact the Sami homelands and Indigenous people’s rights.  

 

Acrylic landscape paintings have a mesmerising dream-like quality that is beautiful with an eerie undertone. They convey nature as a living, spiritual force and framing the canvases with hand knotted tassels used on traditional Sami shawls reminds you that people survive and thrive in these landscapes. Their culture, heritage and land need to be protected. 

 

What Outi calls ‘three dimensional pieces’ take centre stage. Outi’s largest installation has been shown around the world, and when you experience it you can see why. The bonus of this exhibition is a new piece created for the show during a residency at Tate St Ives, the colours of which hint at the Cornish environment.

 

With all of the conflict in the world, this burst of colour, the skill of the handmade and the uplifting ‘three dimensional pieces,’ left me feeling a little more optimistic. With artists like Outi PIeski, issues do not go unnoticed and bring awareness to those who are looking. 

 

Outi Pieski is exhibiting at Tate St Ives until 6th of May 2024. https://www.tate.org.uk/visit/tate-st-ives

https://www.outipieski.com/.   https://www.instagram.com/outipieski/

 

Jakkai Siributr exhibition

 

Exhibition view: Jakkai Siributr: Everybody Wanna Be Happy, CHAT (Centre for Heritage, Arts and Textile), Hong Kong, 2023

 

If you are in Hong Kong you’ll be able to visit a retrospective of one of my favourite textile artists. Jakkai Siributr: Everybody Wanna Be Happy is currently exhibiting at the Centre for Heritage Arts & Textile.

Covering work from over two decades, it shows the diverse range of his work both aesthetically and conceptually. Tackling themes of Buddhism in his native Thailand, political issues, materialism and more recently the role of family, this exhibition gives pause for thought through exquisite pieces of textile art.

 

Jakkai Siributr: Everybody Wanna Be Happy is on show until 13th February 2024. To find out more visit https://www.mill6chat.org/

Inquiry about Forgotten Birds Collection

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Last year I featured Iranian artist Tina Rouhandeh on Instagram and details of a piece from her forthcoming exhibition ‘Inquiry about Forgotten Birds.’ Tina is now based in Canada but she still has a deep connection with her homeland. Inquiry about Forgotten Birds is now complete and is a collection of work about human rights violations in Iran since 2018. Growing up with discrimination of Iranian Baha’i community she “witnessed how discrimination and injustice increased until [it] covered the entire society, causing an undeniable feeling of suffocation and uncertainty about the future”

 

Comprising of five main works, each piece took at least seven month each to create. Many of the art woks are created using bullion stitches, a technique twisting a thread around a needle several times before inserting it into the fabric. There are 3.500 stitches in one piece. “Each stitch represents one individual, and each twist around the needle signifies the prayers of their loved ones for them.”

 

Inquiry about Forgotten Birds is exhibiting at Art Windsor Essex, Ontario until October 1st. To find out more visit http://www.tinarouhandeh.com/    

https://artwindsoressex.ca/exhibitions/tina-rouhandeh-inquiry-about-forgotten-birds/

Michele Landel Exhibition

 

Michele Landel

Images: Nobody #5; Nobody #6; Self Portrait #8; Gather a few Stones, all photograph, fabric, thread and varnish, 2023.

 

 

Michele Landel is an American textile artist who has lived in Sèvres, France since 2005. Watering the Stones is a collection of work from a residency she experienced earlier this year in the desert mountains of Spain. The area was so quiet she “discovered the soft sounds of nature, the clean colour palette of the land, and the engaging beauty of the place.”

The work centres on organic and non organic items such as discarded sticks and a broken watering can she found in the fields. Michele took photos combing human and natural debris creating poetic images which she printed and quilted onto bedsheets. Bedding is an item signifying comfort, resting and healing the images take on a soulful quality. “On the bedding, the forms and shapes become sensual and soulful. The material activates tactile memories.”

 

Watering the Stones by Michele Landel is exhibiting from 15th – 30th September at Le Salon Vert and is part of the first Geneva Art Week. For more information visit www.salonvert.ch.and www.michelelandel.com

 

Tapestry meets Architecture

      

Under the Milky Way tonight … by Multiplicity

 

Counterpoint by Adjacency Studio

 

Fata Morgana by Yiling Shen and Yuchen Gao

 

 

Solstice by Beth George and Emerald Wise

 

Once Upon a Time by Studio Orsi

 

I’ve just returned from a holiday in Australia and one thing I love is the large-scale tapestries adorning public buildings. Tapestries hang in government buildings in the capital and even my local library when I lived in Sydney. Many of these are created by The Australian Tapestry Workshop (the ATW) which has woven contemporary tapestries since 1976. Their weavings aren’t just limited to public spaces in Australia. They have found their way to public buildings around the world including in Singapore, France and Bombay. 

The ATW has lots of events in its calendar including The Tapestry Design Prize 2023 for Architects. Now in its fifth year, this prize encourages “innovation and visionary thinking by challenging architects to design contemporary tapestries.” Offering a $10,000 prize it attracts entries from Australian and international practices. This year the brief was to create a tapestry for the award-winning Bundanon Art Museum.

For professionals who dedicate their careers to designing spaces that often appear like a work of art, seeing their rendering of potential tapestries that introduce softness to angular buildings is fascinating. Some entries such as Once Upon and Time by Studio Orsi use the image as a canvas. Others including Jesse Osadczuk with Under the milky way tonight.. hang within the gallery space to become an almost immersive experience. Here are a few of the finalists and I’ll let you know the winner when it’s announced in early September. 

The Tapestry Design Prize for Architects 2023 is generously supported by Metal Manufactures Limited, Architecture Media and Creative Victoria. To find out more visit https://www.austapestry.com.au/