We are delighted to present our eighth edition of the Changing Threads event. Changing Threads has gone from an interesting first show to where we now showcase work of the highest calibre from some of New Zealand’s leading exponents of the contemporary textile and fibre world. International interest in the show has been growing, and as a direct result of this, a group of New Zealand fibre and textile artists presented a critically acclaimed exhibition at the prestigious Knitting and Stitching Show in London, Harrogate and Dublin. Many thousands of visitors viewed this work, and Arts Council Nelson was delighted to work with Alysn Midgelow-Marsden to make this a reality. Changing Threads is featured in many magazines and articles, both in New Zealand and overseas. We have always aimed to challenge the public perception of fibre and textile art by selecting pieces which have a strong conceptual basis, and are thought provoking, insightful, quirky, humorous or inspirational. Entries submitted go through a two stage selection process which ensures that work has both a strong conceptual basis to suit our vision, and a high technical and artistic standard. Arts Council Nelson wish to thank our long-term sponsor Bernina New Zealand, and our other sponsors who are crucial to the continuation of Changing Threads. We are delighted to continue our show in the Refinery ArtSpace as we feel this is an ideal venue for fostering and showcasing the arts in Nelson.
Cover Image - Picture Credit: Kate Ireland, Relentless Steel, detail. Full image page 19.
Ronnie Martin Creative Director Changing Threads
Margaret Johnston __________________ The Plastic Net
640 x 1560mm Recycled Nelson Mail plastic bags, Aluminium, Wood.
The Nelson newspaper is delivered in rural areas encased in clear plastic bags as protection from the sun and rain. There is an irony in the fact that these bags are designed to protect the newspaper, yet the plastic bags pollute our landscape and waterways!!! Only 14% of plastic is recycled, and fragments of plastic can be found in the gut of marine life, and many are dying as a result of becoming entangled in the plastic which floats freely in the oceans and rivers. ‘The Plastic Net’ is a representation of the danger inherent in the use of plastic bags, and the fact that we are trapped in their use. Or are we? 1
Christine Wingels __________________ Vanity
1130 x 640mm Various fabrics machine stitched on felt.
We are all the same, a bit different though, and some are special.
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Alysn Midgelow-Marsden ________________________ On the ‌ run, fly and cross 3 pieces, each 40 x 50mm
A triptych exploring the textures and interaction of stitch markings and layering of fabrics.The fabrics have been resisted and dyed in the shibori manner, then patched with the careful sensibilities of boro and joined with simple, rhythmic stitches. A glimpse of rocky scenery and landscape flashes across the pieces breaking the lines with delicately interesting lines.
Alysn Midgelow-Marsden ________________________ All grown and gone
2000 x 750 x 750mm Stainless steel fabric, organza thread, acetate. Machine applique, free machine and hand stitch.
Three hanging columns. Each represents one of my children, grown, now strong, resilient and self-supporting, all from the same tree and all different and beginning to branch out for themselves.
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Christine Wingels __________________ Hidden Treasures
Variable heights, highest 1160mm
Aren’t they beautiful? You want one? Hard to get onto, and if you manage to get hold of one it can be very painful to not let go.
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Christine Wingels __________________ Tattoo 1070 x 1100mm
A design variation based on a classic Maori Tattoo, here not stitched into skin, but on industrial fiberglass fabric.
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Carol Telfer ________________ Space for Growth
910 x 610mm Painted fabric, collage and embroidery.
This work was made as an object of contemplation for the purpose of suggesting the potential for personal growth and development. It serves as a visual reminder to embrace new possibilities and verifies the opportunity for change. The triangle motif is used as a symbol for growth and energy and the background area is suggestive of a space where thoughts and actions can take place. The use of symbols, sumptuous colour and texture creates an object which evokes the spiritual domain and an enriched experience of the world.
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Shena Mali ________________ Weathered Hopes 55 x 120mm
‘Weathered Hopes’ highlights the starting points from where we all take new directions. Pulled through brass circles we find unexpected chapters. This contemporary tribal piece incorporates metallic and enamel paints, cotton geo shapes on linen, raw clay, wood, hemp and brass.
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Trisha Findlay _____________ Convergence 2
1016 x 965mm Quilted Cotton, thread and batting
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Trisha Findlay _____________ Convergence 3
1170 x 1170mm Quilted Cotton, thread and batting
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Linda Morris ______________ Security Blanket Rosemary Mortimer ___________________ So It Seems III
1020 x 1040mm Cotton, silk, rust, shellac and gesso. Shibori, machine and hand stitching, rust dying and offset printing.
Undone and re-made, fondled and stitched through multiple iterations over a five year period, this work records an evolving journey of materials and process that explores consumption and obsession. In ‘So it Seems’, while sewing seams, I can draw together the threads of my fractured world, ragged and resistant to order.
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1020 x 1040mm This work incorporates vintage woollen blanket strips, woven and punctured with brass studs and overlaid with laced copper wire. This represents the ‘corset’ that is technology.
This work was developed as part of a current theme I’m exploring in my art practice around digital communication and how it simultaneously connects and isolates us. The blanket represents comfort, but it’s a false comfort. There is also some painted reference to texting and the copper wire also stands for the threads of communication that seem so strong and direct when we email text or message yet are really more random and less linear than we imagine. The juxtaposition of the wool and the copper also highlight the change in New Zealand from the old to the new.
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Lois Morgan _____________________________ The Story Teller [top] and The Scholar [bottom] 300 x 280 x 160mm and 385 x 385 x 140mm
My ‘working dogs’ are created first of all from driftwood sourced from my home beach on the Monaco Peninsula, and other beaches within Tasman and Golden Bays. I find a body here, a leg there, heads and tails, and the pieces together begin to ‘talk’ to me about who/what they might be when assembled. At this point I consider the role to be portrayed, and glue and screw the pieces together to determine that. For the next stage I use book spines from old books to make collaged clothing, as well as old books them13 selves in the role required.
Clare Plug _______________ Arctic Defrosting
1000 x 830mm Woven and non-woven fabrics. Painted, stitched, fused and heat distressed.
The Arctic region is warming at twice the rate of the rest of the Earth. The cause is primarily our increasing carbon dioxide emissions. If the Arctic ice is to continue its vital role as a major temperature regulation mechanism, this carbon dioxide release must be halted and emission levels reduced urgently.
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Giles Panting _________________ Frida I: The Artist
1930 x 1070mm Cotton fabric, cotton batting. Machine and hand pieced, hand quilted.
These works are a continuing exploration of how simple geometric shapes can be arranged to add meaning and narrative to a quilt (often of significance only to its maker). I am influenced by the quilts made by African-American quilters who piece their work intuitively, with naïve sophistication and without restraint – really ‘outsider art’ in a pure form.
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Giles Panting ________________ Frida II: The Pain
1980 x 1070mm Cotton fabric, cotton batting. Machine and hand pieced, hand quilted.
The two quilts entered are part of a series where I am reflecting on a twodecade long fascination with the artist Frida Kahlo; her art and her life. In these works I am also exploring the use of traditional quilt blocks and patterns to add symbolism and meaning to seemingly abstract quilts. It is important to me that whilst I view my quilts as artworks in their own right, they still retain their integrity to function as quilts in the traditional sense. 16
“No child or future generation will ever know what this was like. They will never understand. When it is over we will go quietly among the living and we will not tell them. We will talk and sleep and go about our business like human beings. We will seal what we have seen in the silence of our hearts and no words will reach us.”
From Birdsong, by Sebastian Faulks, published by Hutchinson. Reproduced by kind permission of Random House Group Ltd.
Cathy Kenkel ______________________ And no words, version 2
400 x 600mm Construction and materials: 6 stitched fabric collages, mounted via Velcro onto plywood frame. Cottons, organza, silk scraps, gauze, wrapped grape vine prunings.
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I was particularly struck by the phrase “and no words will reach us”. It hammered home to me the extraordinary endurance needed by these men and women involved in World War One. Both to survive the experience and to mend and heal as best they could in the civilian life which came after. This piece attempts to reflect and honour this endurance. Much of my work reflects the fracture and repair necessary in our daily lives.
A deconstructed quilt. Second in a series honouring the soldiers who fought in Gallipoli. Hand dyed and distressed silk fabric has been hand manipulated to represent trenches, hills and mortar fire. The latter is represented by the 3 dimensional burnt elements in the fabric where the exploding fleece wool symbolises the ravaged earth, foliage and humanity. The French knots serve a double purpose as representing artillery and rifle fire whilst forming the quilting element of the work. The thread for the crosses was salvaged from a WW2 silk parachute.
Carole Sorrell _____________ Entrenched 2
700 x 400mm Original design: Silk, fleece wool, cotton, pellon batting, perle thread, rayon thread, silk thread salvaged from a WW2 silk parachute.
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Kate Ireland _______________ Relentless Steel
750 x 300 x 210mm Human Spine model layered with textiles, paint and steel pins.
“Courage is to feel the daily daggers of relentless steel and to keep on living”. We made steel in my industrial birth place, and when faced with fear we remember that our back bones are strong because they too are made of steel. Courage is not living without fear, but choosing to continue despite it.
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Kate Ireland _____________ Sweet Sorrow
550 x 290 x 290mm Embroidered lace sculpture of a human skull.
“Parting is such sweet sorrow”. How can loss be so painful and yet bring such relief? Life and Death are full of bitter sweet endings. When living becomes unbearable, who are we to force that life to continue? Is death really so dark when it has become the only release?
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Kate Ireland _________________________________________________ `The Price of Love’ 290 x 210 x 210mm Hand Embroidered papier-mâché sculpture of a human heart
When, at the age of 29, my best friend’s heart literally broke, so did the hearts of those who loved her. Kept prisoner by her sick body, only in death was her soul finally able to fly free.
Julie Brawley _____________________ Mantel of my Ancestors
1500 x 1500mm
Inspired by a behind the scenes tour of ancestral cloaks at Te Papa. A work of art made for the body and returned to the wall as a tribute to loving faces never forgotten. 3d tapestry technique developed specifically for this project out of sensitivity for my heritage.
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detail
detail
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Chrissie Cleary _______________ 013.51
593 x 593 x 90mm Plastic, poly/cotton thread. Machine lockstitch.
Chrissie Cleary _________________ a matter of process
3000 x 1200mm Paper, monofilament. Freeform Machine stitch.
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The joy of process. Unfolding, evolving. Perfectly imperfect. A passionate journey.
detail
Dark horizontal lines signifying stability, randomly ravelling clumps conveying the opposite. Two sides, two impressions, a conflict of sorts. And yet, as with all things human, what you see is only half the story.
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Donna Dinsdale ____________________ Wedding Performance 600 x 850mm
This art work is centred on my exploration of how a personal bi-cultural viewpoint can be expressed through textile cultural artefacts. Based on the traditional wedding poem “something old, something
new, something borrowed, something true….”
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Contemporary “Poi” represents the parallels between the poi used in the New Zealand tourist industry by Māori cultural groups as a highly visible tool to communicate Māori culture to foreign tourists and the use of wedding accessories as an object in a wedding ritual (performance). Juxtaposition of embellishment and textiles reveals an interesting mix of colours, textures and patterns that communicate cultural diversity. The placement of the wedding poem text in regard to the images, printed textiles and embellishment encourages viewers to question cultural boundaries and their own personal viewpoints within Aotearoa.
Donna Dinsdale ____________________________ God Save Our Gracious Queen
940 x 940mm
Utilizing symbolism drawn from Aotearoa’s rich heritage, contemporary korowai is used as a vehicle to capture characteristics from post-colonial New Zealand. The use of the korowai design incorporated with assorted traditional and contemporary textiles and trims (such as tapa cloth, metallic thread, silk thread, coins), explore and uncover unfamiliar methods in which a personal bi-cultural viewpoint can be visually expressed. The use of pre-loved textile artefacts of value creates an immediate aesthetic to the piece, expressing sentimental threads of history which represents a reconfigured New Zealand design aesthetic that communicates a strong visual bi-cultural reference.
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Rowena Lukomska __________________ Waterfall
3 panels at 1340 x 800mm
Taken from the series ‘noughts and crosses’ by using the cut and paste technique, successive black and white layered fabrics have been stitched, cut, reassembled, layered, stitched, cut then reassembled again and again, forming three columns of fabric reminiscent of a waterfall.
Lynn Price ________________ Unknown Territory
800 x 800mm 25 installation pieces Flax fibre, encaustic wax, graphite. Digital photography, frottage, collage.
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detail
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Michelle de Silva ________________ Three Chairs
360 x 460mm Hand stitched thread on canvas
Michelle de Silva’s current body of work uses stitching to describe parts of stories. These works are inspired by the fleeting mundane objects that she finds along the roadside. It is the stories of these objects that interest her, where they have been, how they came to be where they are, and where they disappear. She looks at the everyday objects which form her environment; those things we look at but never see. The environments which make up de Silva’s world remain eerie and un-peopled and it is this lack of humanity which throws up questions about what could have happened, if indeed anything has.
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Michelle de Silva ____________________ Neighbourhood Watch
360 x 430mm Hand stitched thread on canvas
De Silva is interested in story telling but not grand myths and legends, or heroic feats but the story behind the picture, the truth of which we may never know. Much like the first or last line in book or play, a story is about to unfold, or has just ended. The players are off stage and what happens next is up to the viewer.
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Christine McGuigan ___________________ Call of the Trail
680 x 680 x 80mm Machine embroidery, crochet, cycle wheel and paper/calico mono-print backing.
Nelson’s Great Taste cycle trail around Tasman estuary is, for me and many cyclists, a beautiful, manageable ride. In this work, I have combined three passions – cycling, sewing and painting – into an art piece that depicts my compelling need to do … to get on that bike and see. Then, using thread as my ink I fashion memories of this trail into three dimensional textile images.
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Fleur Woods ____________ I AM the Land
600 X 660mm Mixed Media on Silk Screen including hand embroidery.
Fleur Woods is a mixed media artist based in Upper Moutere. ‘I AM the Land’ is a mixed media piece finished with intricate hand-stitching. This work serves to illustrate the artists’ connection to the environment. The stitching physically binds the human form to the landscape further emphasising the intrinsic connection between people and nature. Stitching itself has a timeless feminine quality that brings a sense of reflection to this contemporary piece.
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Colleen Plank _____________________________________ PUKA –Meryta sinclairii (puka or pukanui) A Sub Tropical Paradise. 9 leaves, variable dimensions
This work represents the process of taking my hand drawn images and then stitching them out using digital technology. The transformation of these New Zealand iconic sub tropical leaves into a textile work has taken on its own journey by initially having a lush glossy outer then with time transforming and moulding each one to reveal its own individual and fragile details. Within this work there seems to be a kind of parallel to our existence here in this sub tropical paradise.
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Kimi Birdsong Coutts _____________________ Thread of Reason
1400 x 400 X 400mm Found , used and discarded items.
In this work I have explored the terms Organic and Inorganic and what they mean to us. Playing with the tensions between the two, I take the observer beyond traditional art terminology and react wholeheartedly to what they may mean. I realise we, as humans, must come to find a balance between the two, especially if we wish to survive well into the future!
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Rowena Lukomska __________________ XX kiss kiss IV
1300 x 800mm Machine and hand stitch.
Taken from the series ‘noughts and crosses’, “XX kiss kiss IV” portrays the acronym S.W.A.L.K (Sealed With A Loving Kiss) as written on envelopes by front line soldiers to their sweethearts back home, during the Second World War.
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Yvonne Hammond __________________ Kai Raranga 460 x 360 x 50mm
The layering on of encaustic wax gives a ‘time shift’ to an event that is ‘past’. The people to me are inter-generational and in touch with the earth having harvested their flax from the pa harakeke. Now they sit and weave; weave their lives, their crafts, their knowing together into baskets. The wax ‘medium’ is beeswax and tree sap, these are both natural products. A piece of Raranga, flax weaving, has been preserved into the wax as well.
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Merrilyn George _______________ Remnant 760 x 680mm
Recognising that we collect and keep remnants of our lives in a number of forms, I make an attempt to clear out after fifty years teaching. I throw some things out and yet hang onto or scan parts I am not yet able to discharge or detach from. It is going to be a work in progress. This work embodies palimpsest and images, remains or remnants of the process of creativity.
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Merrilyn George _________________ Art is not about Art 1050 x 680mm
Recreating art for me is about the process of working through life’s issues, confronting loss, pain and grief, accepting the gift of life and acknowledging the need to use materials from the earth’s rich resource, along with the pleasure of creating. We exist and create from an interconnected and interdependent universe.
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Yvonne Hammond _______________________________ Solar Protection; the hat that grew 1600 x 1200 x 1200mm
An artwork woven from NZ Flax which has been grown under the sun, in the shape of a hat to protect us from the sun, hung in the space above us like the sun. I am confident my weaving is singing its music, speaking its language, adjusting its shape and showing its form in the same way as the New Zealand natural flax (harakeke) from which it was created. My recent woven artworks are like wild weaving pieces; looking proud, like a wicked stepmother questioning the boundaries of what art and craft really are.
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In addition to our wonderful sponsors, the Arts Council Nelson Executive Committee wish to acknowledge and thank the following for their valued contribution toward this showcase. Selectors: Jo Kinross, Lloyd Harwood and Ronnie Martin Judges: Dame Suzie Moncrieff DNZM, Lloyd Harwood and Ronnie Martin Friends and supporters of Arts Council Nelson who form the hard working team of volunteers who help to ensure the smooth running and success of the event. Last but not least, our heartfelt appreciation goes to our amazing artists from around the country whose efforts and commitment enable us to provide such a wonderful showcase of contemporary New Zealand fibre and textile practice.
CHANGING THREADS 2016 National Contemporary Fibre Awards
Arts Council Nelson acknowledge and thank the following sponsors, whose support has enabled this greatly valued event.