MMT2 research
Pippa Andrews ~ http://www.materialspace.com/page4.htm
I use textile techniques to make structures derived from organic and architectural forms. Space, light, form and the relationship of elements to each other are key concerns for both large scale installations and small individual pieces. While most of my work is three dimensional, I also make art for walls and jewellery.
I love this work, it is so scrummy and textural, it looks just like something I could have made, and I don’t mean that in any kind of patronising “anyone could make this” way, but more in a “that’s how my mind works too” kinda way. I feel this will definitely influence my work, in what way remains to be seen yet but I am drawn to the vessels above all else.
Barbara Cotterell ~ http://www.materialspace.com/page6.htm
“A love and experience of handling textiles still influences my work. Recycled materials are my preferred medium, as they have both individual character and a group identity. I am fascinated by the subtle changes of the repeating image and manipulation of materials to create pattern. More recently I have been making pots with wire for the garden, incorporating movement and surprisingly, sound. Three factors inform my creative expression; reuse of materials, pattern and multi-sensory characteristics”
I like Barbara’s ethos, reusing and recycling feels natural to me. But I don’ find the way it has been executed exciting enough to inspire me.
Andy Goldsworthy ~ http://www.artnet.com/artists/andy-goldsworthy/
Andy Goldsworthy is a British artist known for his site-specific installations involving natural materials and the passage of time. Working as both sculptor and photographer, Goldsworthy crafts his installations out of rocks, ice, leaves, or branches, cognizant that the landscape will change, then carefully documents the ephemeral collaborations with nature through photography. “It’s not about art,” he has explained. “It’s just about life and the need to understand that a lot of things in life do not last.”
I have loved his work for decades, I adore the way he sees nature, rearranges natural elements to exaggerateand highlight existing patterns. I am not sure it will ever influence my work as it feels quite far removed from textiles and I also don’t have the patience Andy has!
PS Having got into printing photos and working into them I did keep thinking of Andy’s work as I was contemplating wrapping trees and stitching into fences!
Judith Scott ~ https://www.textileartist.org/textile-artist-judith-scott-uncovering-innate-talent
Judith was born with Down’s Syndrome in a time when children with such disabilities were not expected to live at home. Separated from her twin sister aged 7 she was placed in an institution and largely forgotten about. Aged 43 her twin Joyce managed to become her legal guardian and took her home to live with her and her family.
Joyce enrolled Judith at the Creative Growth Art Centre in Oakland as a means of occupying her time; Joyce was working as a pediatric nurse so 24-hour care of her sister was impossible.
Creative Growth is a visionary arts centre where people with mental or psychological difficulties are given total artistic freedom. Joyce Scott describes it as ‘joyful’.
For nearly two years, Judith was unresponsive; she didn’t enjoy painting, sculpture or sewing. But one fiber arts workshop with the textile artist Sylvia Seventy changed all that. Finally Judith had discovered something she loved, and what’s more, something for which she had an innate talent.
She spontaneously started wrapping pieces of wood in fiber, fabric and threads and created her earliest pieces, since referred to as ‘totems’.
From then on she didn’t stop. She was constantly creating. Her process was erratic and instinctive. She would wrap thread and yarn around anything she could get her hands on; she appropriated magazines, chairs and even a bicycle wheel. It quickly became a source of communication for Judith, having been verbally and socially ‘blocked’ for most of her life. Tom di Maria, director of Creative Growth, believes she was finally ‘learning to speak’. Her early pieces were her first words.
Judith became the first ever artist with Down’s Syndrome to be featured in the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. Her work can still be seen in permanent collections in New York City, Paris, and London.
I love Judith’s work, her joy in her creations is obvious. Her work is intuitive, exuberant, very free. I found my wrapping work naturally veered quite towards the same colourful slightly chaotic vein as Judith’s. Very inspiring!
Christo and Jeanne-Claude ~ https://christojeanneclaude.net
Born on the same day in Bulgaria and Morocco, respectively, the pair met and married in Paris in the late 1950s. Originally working under Christo’s name, they later credited their installations to both “Christo and Jeanne-Claude”. Until his own death in 2020, Christo continued to plan and execute projects after Jeanne-Claude’s death in 2009.
Their work was typically large, visually impressive, and controversial, often taking years and sometimes decades of careful preparation — including technical solutions, political negotiation, permitting and environmental approval, hearings and public persuasion. The pair refused grants, scholarships, donations or public money, instead financing the work via the sale of their own artwork.
Christo and Jean Claude described the myriad elements that brought the projects to fruition as integral to the artwork itself, and said their projects contained no deeper meaning than their immediate aesthetic impact; their purpose being simply for joy, beauty, and new ways of seeing the familiar. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christo_and_Jeanne-Claude)
Christo and Jeanne-Claude’s work is very impressive, the scale is very ambitious and brings a smile to my face! I did try to bring their sense of fun into my own wrapping project but I’m afraid just wrapping normal sized objects wasn’t really inspiring enough for me.
Karola Pezarro ~ https://www.textileartist.org/karola-pezarro-somewhere-else
Karola Pezarro trained at the Royal Academy of Art in The Hague, in the Department of Architectural Design and Environmental Design
Until the end of the 1980s, I primarily made constructions with stacks of paper, textile folded into a variety of patterns, occasionally coloured. At the end of the 1980s, the exclusive concentration on the exploration of form, structure and the use of materials no longer sufficed. This artistic inquiry by means of very small steps was too far removed from my daily life and personal experiences. At the foundation of my work since then lies a strong sense of wonder about the fragility of life, wonder about the working of one’s memory, about the visible and the invisible. About how you remember your history, how you renew it and imagine it. These questions form the basic tones of my body of work. All of this is regularly conveyed by means of all kinds of elements that branch off from the whole. Sometimes, these are patterns that remind one of bloodstreams, but it could just as well be bundles of cables or city plans. Or other structures. Inner architecture
Besides drawing a lot, I’m always taking photos. I’m interested in architecture and the city, but nature also regularly crops up in my images. Since 2003 I have photographed parts of my hometown The Hague. I wandered through town, capturing specific details. I subsequently combine, draw, write and zoom in to such an extent that the process results in new images with alternate meanings. So I created the series ‘Inna architektura’ (2009).
In search of images I cross the city, freeze images in time, distil and discover hidden shapes, I create a small photo archive: the city, me and the image, a source for works about the city, inna architektura, I print, cut, embroider.
I really like what Karola has to say, I like how she looks at the world, it isn’t too dissimilar from how I go about my daily life, seeing patterns and takking photos of everything. But I don’t find her actual work that inspiring strangely although I strongely suspect I would love it much more in real life than from seeing it online.
Debbie Lyddon~ www.debbielyddon.co.uk
Debbie is an artist/ maker who lives on the coast in Norfolk. Nature is what inpsires her. The edges of land and sea. She often makes sculptural textile vessels, with her trademark grommets giving you a peek inside or even all the way through!
My work is informed by: Things I have noticed; Things I have remembered; The light, water, the weather; The processes and rhythms of natural phenomena; Remoteness; Impermanence, change and degeneration; Sounds, stillness and silence
I discovered Debbie’s work when I enrolled as member on the TextileArtist website for a month. I didn’t really have time to dedicate to taking the workshops offered but I did watch the video of Debbie making her salt encrusted vessels. I love her work, the colours and shapes and textures are amazing. I tend to find myself making very different work, much more cartoony and brightly coloured, so I don’t think Debbie’s work would influence mine too much but I am very glad I discovered her!
