Practice Led Research
Throughout the course of this year, I have been inspired by a range of texts and artists. The first section is research into how I approach making in my practice. I have reflected on the way I interpret my subconscious mind when it comes to my creative process. Figuring out what excites me within a final work and building off of that in future works. In doing so I am able to create a regenerative framework that I can rely on for years to come.
Key Artists
The next section is a selection of artist who have inspired my practice in different ways. Margaret Wertheim and Christine Wertheim, Vanessa Barragão and Kaffe Fassett have been incredible inspirations to my practice. I have taken direct inspiration from many different aspects of their works. The technique of using hyperbolic geometry to create different shapes has come from the crochet reefs of Margaret Wertheim and Christine Wertheim’s work. Vanessa Barragão’s use of yarn to create shifting landscapes has inspired the development of my micro works. Kaffe Fassett has inspired me to take risks and enjoy bright colours across my practice as a whole.
Additional Artists
The final selection of artists has helped shape my thinking throughout this past year. A diverse group of artists that have either through their work affected my way of thinking. In these cases, I have only been affected by small aspects of their work. There is a small distance between my practice and theirs.
Practice Led Research
Practice led research is a contextual framework that artists and designers alike use to incorporate the physical aspect of experimentation and creative methods from their practice into their research. It allows for the art to become research and generate new works/research.1
1 Hazel Smith , and Roger T. Dean, Practice-led Research, Research-led Practice in the Creative Arts (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2009), 5.
Researcher introspection
The text Researcher introspection for experience- driven design research by Haian Xue and Pieter M. A. Desmet changed the way I look at research and my own practise. The text goes into depth on introspection as a research method for gathering data on wide groups of people. However, I am only going to focus on the ‘researcher-introspection’…
Practice-led Research, Research-led Practice in the Creative Arts by Hazel Smith , and Roger T. Dean (Chapter 1)
In the first chapter of Practice-led Research, Research-led Practice in the Creative Arts, Hazel Smith , and Roger T. Dean first defined the term research by using the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development’s (OECD) definition, “which served as an international standard for defining research and development.”1 The definition reads, creative work undertaken on a…
Concurrent Introspection
Joanne Donovan
In the text, Textiles from our place: exploring connective textile making as a phenomenology of locale Joanne Donovan explores many different ideas connected to her practise of craft making textiles. A particular idea that stood out to me was the concept of improvisation within a material driven art practice. Donovan describes this by saying, “Textiles…
Key Artists
Concurrent Introspection
Margaret Wertheim and Christine Wertheim – Crochet Reef
Twin sisters Margaret Wertheim and Christine Wertheim started the Crochet Coral Reef in 2005. The project combined mathematics, marine biology, feminine handicraft and environmental activism. Margaret Wertheim and Christine Wertheim were concerned by the effect of global warming on the coral reefs. Coral is fragile and can die from the slightest increase in water temperature.…
Concurrent Introspection
Vanessa Barragão
Vanessa Barragão is an environmental and textile artist from Portugal. She studied fashion but shifted to working with textiles at the end of her masters. In an interview, Barragão talked about feeling out of sync with the fast pace of the fashion industry. She prefers the slow movement that she is able to capture in…
Concurrent Introspection
Kaffe Fassett
Kaffe Fassett began his career as a painter but in the 60s on a trip to Scotland became enamored by the beautiful colours and textures yarn/wool could create.1 He took up knitting and designed many patterns that shaped fashion in knitwear throughout the 60s and 70s.2 He became well known for his geometric patterns and…
Additional Artists
Retrospective Introspection
Germain Koh – Knitwork
knitwork by Germain Koh is a lifelong project started in 1992. The project consists of unraveled recycled yarn being knitted into a continuous garment that keeps growing. Koh unwinds old, knitted jumpers and blankets found in op-shops and knits them into the existing garment. The garment has a consistent weight, despite the fact that lots…
Concurrent Introspection
Kate Just
Kate Just is political and feminist fibre artist working to bring awareness to a wider audience. Just creates knitted images and text to convey messages of political outrage/ awareness of female plight or, with her most recent exhibition, healthy words to live by. Although her technique of knitting is the same throughout her practise the…
Concurrent Introspection
Sheila Hicks
Sheila Hicks is a fibre artist who started in the in the 1950s. She was a pioneer of the fibre arts and continues to make art today. Hicks focuses heavily on her materials by manipulating them in interesting and new ways. In many of her older works, such as Multi-coloured Minime, she used the technique…
Imaginary Introspection
Teresa Lanceta
Teresa Lanceta is a Spanish textile artist inspired by Moroccan hangings and North African textiles. Lanceta learnt this ancient style of weaving from local Berber women in 1985 after spending time in the Middle Atlas Mountains. While there Lanceta emersed herself in the weaving communities she and discovered a newfound appreciation for these age-old customs…
Imaginary Introspection
Sheila Pepe
Sheila Pepe is a textiles artist based in Texas, U.S.A.. In 2010 they where invited by bring their current work Common Sense to Tbilisi in the republic of Georgia and work with skilled local crafts women. The work had intentionally been created in a way so that when a thread is pulled it begins to…
Sarah Jacquiline 