Metropolis textiles by Claesson Koivisto Rune
The Swedish architecture and design studio got the inspiration to create such an original textile pattern from travelling. By flying above cities when approaching any airport the urban fabric becomes visible and omnipresent. They got the maps of cities to which they had travelled and started choosing the most interesting parts.
Cells, diatoms and neurons are just a few of the things that inspire Betty Busby’s quilts.
A message of love from somebody you care about will always make you feel warm and fuzzy, but maybe even more so when that message is woven in cashmere. Holly Berry makes scarves and blankets that say “I love you” in colorful patterns made from morse code.
Berry on her work:
I use letters and markings from the Morse-code alphabet to subtly create a dialogue between maker, owner and textile. I believe we hold a lot of stories and memories in our favourite textiles. Each hand woven piece is a portrait of a maker and user of the cloth, communicating messages of love, identity or memory held within the woven textile structure. My blankets all spell LOVE in Morse-code and commissions can say whatever secret message you desire.
Her morse code alphabet:
Science is lovely in silk (at least it is in the hands of Karen Kamenetzky).
Kamenetzky on her work:
I dye, paint and stitch cottons and silks to create boldly colored wallhangings inspired by microscopic/cellular imagery - a kind of visual invented biology with textiles. I find this imagery metaphorically rich since all change fundamentally happens on this infinitesimal level.
Karine Jollet constructs body parts from old bed sheets and shirts, embroided handkerchieves and second-hand fabrics.
Jollet on her work:
The body as an enigma, I explore it, step by step, like a space that I need to reconstruct, to unify.
Fabrics are materials that came naturally to me as an analogy to our own biological tissues: bones, fibres, cristalls…
Selected work by Gabriel Dawe.
About the artist:
Gabriel Dawe was born in Mexico City where he grew up surrounded by the intensity and color of Mexican culture. After working as a graphic designer, he moved to Montreal, Canada in 2000 following a desire to explore foreign land. In search for creative freedom he started experimenting and creating artwork, which eventually led him to explore textiles and embroidery—activities traditionally associated with women and which were forbidden for a boy growing up in Mexico. Because of this, his work is subversive of notions of masculinity and machismo that are so ingrained in his culture. By working with thread and textiles, Dawe’s work has evolved into creating large-scale installations with thread, creating environments that deal with notions of social constructions and their relation to evolutionary theory and the self-organizing force of nature.
Protein Art - In Thread and Ink by Jenny Langley
Langley on her work:
Many aspects of protein structure inspire my work. Sawtooth lines represent the strong protein ‘backbone’, there are hints of helices, pleating, U-bends, random structure and the energetic electrons found at active sites. Prints taken from the textile represent the ephemeral contact during an enzyme reaction. All threads and materials are silk, a protein of course!
Communicating Bacteria Dress and MRSA Quilt by Anna Dumitriu.
Dumitriu on her work:
Public understanding of science, in particular biomedical science and the ethics of emerging technologies is so important, particularly in terms of microbiology and I feel a responsibility to share the knowledge I acquire with the wider public. I feel strongly that anyone can understand anything if it’s explained in the right way for them. Many businesses play on public fears in order to add value to their products, and newspapers and TV shows fill our minds with images of bacteria as armies of tiny monsters ready to attack unless we buy some new hand wash or detergent. The press and its desire to sell newspapers can even sway political opinion at the highest level. I recently created indigo blue coloured patchwork quilt stained with MRSA bacteria grown on chromogenic agar and patterned with clinical antibiotics and other tools in the research and treatment of this disease. Each square on the quilt can be explained in terms of the research work that went into making it. The public are fascinated to come face to face with the famous ‘superbug’, but in the case of my work the piece has been sterilised (autoclaved) so it is no longer dangerous. Quilts are historically used as story telling devices and this piece tells the story of MRSA and facilitates dialogues.
She will be participating in the Cambridge Science Xchange on October 23.
From The Museum of Fabric Brain Art, this piece is “The Knitted Brain” by Karen Norberg
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