RECLAMATIONS

Documentation of PhD studio experimentation

‘Art helps us to isolate aspects of the world we live in.’

Sarah Quinton (Material Matters, 1998)

My practice-based PhD project (started in February 2022) is deeply informed by the history and materiality of textiles in circulation and driven by care as a holistic feminist strategy. It embodies care for familial and cultural traditions of women's textile-based knowledge, care for the environmental impact of my practice as well as self-care.

Being confined to home due to the global pandemic and having to adjust my practice accordingly has strengthened my aim for a practice of low ecological impact. Coupled with my interest in historical connection between women and textile-based work carried out in the domestic context, this aim has led me to consider ways to use waste and discarded materials.

My research project revolves around reclamation: of the textiles' prior histories, of histories of women makers and their undervalued knowledge, of their silenced voices, as well as of my own. I also like to think of my engagement with textiles and thread as a practice of reclaiming time, as repetitive manual mark making slows down and registers the time spent stitching.

My studio experimentation reclaims clothes and house textiles and includes processes of stitching, natural dyeing and assemblage. Dyeing processes are being derived from plant waste generated in my home and assemblage uses various personal and found textiles and offcuts.

This blog journal is imagined as a place to document my experimentation.

Thanks for stopping by!