Category: Textiles
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Of cloth, peacocks and Scandinavia
Each month a talk about something in the textile collection in Greymouth Mawhera is held in the Regent Theatre. This month’s event was about art textiles including textiles as artistic mediums, art on textiles, and textiles as art. The subject ranged from the French mid-century printed, woven and needleworks, created by artists and designers as…
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The New Zealand Agricultural Show 2023
There cannot be many things more pleasurable than going to an agricultural show, especially when there are highlights like lambs, calves, tractors and duck herding! The show is held in Otautahi Christchurch each year and we have been eagerly anticipating going to see the wool on show and to speak to farmers and producers. It…
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Lincoln University’s art collection
This week a visit to Lincoln University library led to the campus collection of art. The University, the oldest agricultural teaching institution in the Southern Hemisphere, was created in 1990 when Lincoln College, Canterbury, was made independent of the University of Canterbury. There was no collecting policy in place but after the sale of cigarettes…
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Sure to Rise
Vivienne Mountford, in 1993, created a wonderfully witty and deceptively powerful artwork to celebrate women. Edmond’s Cook Book is a New Zealand institution. For more than 100 years the company has made baking supplies and sold cookbooks. Everybody in Aotearoa knows Edmonds! The old factory building in Otautahi Christchurch became iconic, its facade gracing the…
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Kate Sheppard
Kate Sheppard was a leader of the women’s suffrage movement in New Zealand. In 1847 Kate Malcolm was born in Liverpool, England and migrated in her twenties to Christchurch Otautahi where she married Walter Sheppard, a merchant. In 1885 Kate Sheppard joined the fight for liquor prohibition by becoming a member of the new Women’s…
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The shape of wool
Fire! The word sometimes is warming and comforting, and sometimes it is terrifying, especially when it comes to the power fire has to destroy lives and livelihoods. In 2021 a fire ripped through a large area of land in the Xhariep District of the Free State of South Africa, destroying, amongst others, a merino wool…
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Madras check
The familiar sight of Madras check has a long heritage, and has its origins in everyday casual wear. Born in what was Madras, now Chennai, the capital city of Tamil Nadu, the hand-woven cotton cloth was originally dyed with vegetable colours that ran together when washed, giving a blended look to the soft fabric. It…
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Liz Mitchell supports wool
The New Zealand fashion designer, Liz Mitchell (Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit) , is looking at a revolution for wool. Over lockdowns Liz started to felt with wool and now is on a campaign to increase the appreciation for New Zealand’s strong wool production. You can see the results of her experiments,…
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New additions to the collection
This week four new additions to the studio collection have arrived. Bought at auction, the pieces are by Malcolm Harrison, Penelope Read and Laura Vassilis. Malcolm Harrison was a well-known textile artist and fashion designer, best known for his stitched artworks. This sales page shows some of those and also the art he created. The…
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Textiles of the Mbuti
Over in the northeastern rainforest, the Ituri, of the Democratic Republic of the Congo live the Mbuti people who make unique barkcloth. Pounded out by men and decoratively planted by women, these cloths are worn or used to hang inside huts. If they are worn for ceremonial purposes they are called Pongo. This example in…