Textile Study Group blog

During this time of self-isolation and social distancing, the desire to  share and connect through our creativity is arguably more important than before. It may help to maintain a calmer state of being amidst the ongoing uncertainty. Please enjoy our  conversation with Bobby Britnell  and stay safe.

Bobby Britnell

Are the ideas or themes for this project on going or are they new?
My ideas and themes for this new project for the Textile Study Group have been on-going and reflect my interest and desire to learn more about bark cloth from Southern Uganda. This fascination has been with me since first travelling to Uganda in 2011. After a couple of trips over there my husband and I, with the support of our two sons and a group of 5 trustees set up a charity to support a community towards a more sustainable future. As well as working intensely with the community of Kisaabwa, our visits over to Uganda had me looking at their crafts, and the process of making bark cloth, really capture my imagination in a big way. We used to go there twice a year and after each trip I would bring back bags full of bark cloth, either to sell or for my own work. Sadly we no longer go and my supply is diminishing!!!

The possibilities with the bark cloth are endless and as well as treating it like most other fabrics, with dyeing, printing and surface embellishment, it can also serve as a canvas for applying paint allowing the natural colour of the cloth to show through. I am exploring some of these ideas along with both hand and machine stitch, although compared to more conventional materials it requires a different approach to stitch and using raffia as traditionally used in Uganda is one such approach. I am always exploring new ways of working with the bark cloth and it certainly presents some new and exciting challenges, but for me the emphasis is always on drawing and design and how this can be incorporated onto or into the cloth.

There will be an article in ‘Embroidery’ magazine, coming out in March 2020, for anyone interested in learning more about this unusual material.

We hope you have enjoyed our recent artists interviews, we are now on week five with Ruth Issett.

Ruth Issett

Are the ideas or themes for this project on going or are they new ?
The ideas that are used in my chapter are a small part of an on going conversation that I am having with myself about the quality of colour that I make and how I use it. Individual colours on their own or in their raw state, maybe as dyes, have distinct characteristics. For instance, differences in yellows are very visible as they quickly migrate towards light greens or a deeper yellowy orange. When selecting a blue palette, there are countless distinct blues to choose from such as turquoise, cobalt, indigo or ultramarine. The application of a wet colour is visually different to the dry colour but as your eye becomes trained, your memory recalls the variations in the different hue. Changes in surface will give further variations, using different papers, various media and type of application.  Once the ingredients, papers and fabrics are coloured, further visual challenges present themselves. The actual quality of these materials whether robust, delicate, transparent or opaque is important and become an important part of careful selection. The combining of differing surfaces as well as proportion and process add even more challenges. So there is plenty to keep exploring, it is enthralling and invigorating.

What is your favourite part of the creative process?
The sampling is the undoubtedly the most absorbing aspect of working with textiles and colour. As I tend to create my colour by using a variety of dyeing, painting and printing techniques, where fibres and weaves play an important aspect of the final colour and surface. I am fascinated by exploring specific areas of colour either with dye or with printed colour. I make collections of fabrics by dyeing and printing, selecting fabrics for their specific qualities and acceptance of the dye. I select colour combinations carefully, studying the strength of each colour and the proportional mixtures.  I also spend time painting small trials of colour mixtures on papers, to understand the character of each colour and how they combine together. I explore and evaluate how the colour responds to the different surfaces, fibres and weaves. All these explorations become the ingredients for various series of work, where combinations are explored, proportions altered, and surfaces worked in different manners. The use of constructional methods, either by layering fabrics or the addition of surface stitch is a completely different activity.  Compared with the use of liquid colour, where processes tend to demand an element of speed, combining and arranging surfaces is a much slower and a more contemplative process. Specific combinations are selected, different fabric surfaces from rough coarse linen layered with fine silk organza or soft muted chiffon or crisp cotton organdie, create mouth watering colour sensations. Observing the differing strengths of these particular coloured fabrics is an important ingredient, but once laid in position, the edges, the density and surface become important as well.  To see how the light will change it, how it will alter once placed next to contrasting colour, or when surrounded by that colour is yet another consideration. This research and sampling is endless, exciting and very enriching.

This week we are in conversation with Sarah Burgess.

Sarah Burgess

For my work as part of the Insights project I wanted to continue to investigate the theme of rising sea levels that I began to work with for the Textile Study Group DIS/rupt exhibition. But this time I felt I needed to investigate what is happening due to the climate crisis in the UK; so last year I travelled out to the Norfolk coast several times to walk, draw and talk to people. One of the places I visited was Hemsby where it is very clear to see how the land is slipping into the sea. Increasing storm surges have meant the loss of homes, walking on the beach the remains of lives lived in those houses are obvious; broken pots, rusty metal reinforcement and cascades of plaster litter the sandy cliffs and concrete and tarmac paths are broken off.

I live about as far from the sea as it is possible to get but even in the middle of the UK we are not immune to flood and the effects of torrential storms.

Back in the studio I try to immerse myself in what I have found and also to research what’s happening elsewhere so that my ideas are not limited to one aspect of sea level rise. This is a worldwide issue. I like to use a large sketchbook so that I can draw, collect news clippings and add trials and tests so that I can try and move my ideas on. I also like to write – just notes and questions at this stage. I think I am trying to ask myself both objective and also crazy questions to provoke myself and stimulate further thoughts and ideas. Once I start working with mono-print on fabric or paper it becomes easier to be spontaneous and less in control which has become, for me, part of working with the climate crisis as a theme. We are not in control. Print enables me to have something to react to – with stitch or further layers of print – or scissors. It stops me becoming too precise and measured which can sometimes kill the life in a piece of work. Adding liquid dye has become very exciting and watching the take up of dye across different fibres is fascinating.

Just a reminder that each week we will feature a different TSG member, so if you haven’t seen our first two interviews, scroll down to read Siân Martin and Mandy Pattullo’s response. This week our conversation is  with Penny Burnfield  

Penny Burnfield 

Sometimes it is good to change direction.  The Insights Project has made me  review my work and has led to new ideas.

Recently my art work has had its origin in outside sources: for example, an exhibition in a museum of clothing, the title of a proposed show, or a curator’s brief.  I have enjoyed this approach, it has challenged me and has broadened my artistic practice.  But I wondered how my work might evolve if the title, brief or venue was entirely my personal choice.

My twin passions are art and gardening.  I have the good fortune to live in the Hampshire countryside – 50 years ago I moved, with my husband, into a small cottage with an acre attached.  The house was nearly derelict, and the land was a jungle of weeds and household rubbish. Gradually it has developed into a garden and now it is open to the public with the National Gardens Scheme.  It is a very long-term work-in-progress.

My very first piece of embroidery designed by myself, was a picture of my garden, but that was 40 years ago. Since then I have avoided using the garden as source material, although it is a popular subject for textile artists.  Perhaps that very popularity was the cause of my anxiety – how could I find my own voice?

It takes me time to see a way forward.  I gather ideas in a note book, a sort of brainstorming – this takes the place of a sketchbook. Slowly my thoughts coalesce. I spent time in the garden, absorbing the ‘spirit of the place’, and made a collection of things I found there, both natural and man-made.  These, together countless old samples and scraps, have developed into a series of collages and assemblages, which give me further inspiration.

There is a saying that the way to make better art is to keep making art – I just needed to ‘just go for it’.  I wanted to capture the feelings and emotions evoked by the garden – and the way to find my voice was to see what emerged.

My starting point was to look at what was already in my studio, and see what I could do with it.  I had a bag full of silk organza, space-dyed in shades of green and brown, which I had used as a background for an installation in a Biology Museum.  I also had a large cardboard box full of green yarns and a collection of brightly coloured silk threads

I experimented with overlapping the pieces of organza and stitching them together.  They looked beautiful with light shining through.  I found that the stitching needed to be minimal and long strips of fabric with an irregular lower edge worked well.  I’m attempting to capture the tranquility of the morning light, but it will need something more – just a little bright colour to set again the green?

And in the past I have enjoyed making free-form tapestry weaving. I have used the box of yarn to make a small square using a wide variety of embroidery and knitting yarns.  There is a gap left in the weaving – for something more exuberant to spill out perhaps?  I am working on how to do this  – making samples – whilst continuing to collect ideas in my notebook and to make collages.

This is an exciting change of direction for me.  Bringing my two passions together will hopefully enrich both.  I am looking forward to seeing what develops.