My first degree in 1989 was in textiles and I have recently undertaken a Masters in Textiles at UCA Farnham gaining a distinction. Currently, I am undertaking a PhD in Fine Art at York St. John University. This research project is about materialising the long term experience of parental suicide and will take six years as it is part time.
This will be combined with being a member of, and showing with, The Makers’ Art collective.
My work has frequently involved cloth and stitching, with the garment being a favoured outcome. The PhD has introduced other materials and is taking my work in new directions.
Previous and current work sometimes uses dahlias because my grandfather grew them. When he passed away his son, my uncle, dug them up and shared them around the family and now we all grow them and this link to the family gives them meaning.
The combination of nature and textiles is something that makes perfect sense. It is taking the everyday, the fallen leaves and dropped petals of a flower, and using it to enhance another everyday item: cloth.
Cloth is central to ours lives: we wear it, it protects us; we sleep in it, it cocoons us; and we see it everywhere. We are touched by it continually and yet all too often we forget its importance. Cloth is in a unique position to give beauty, whether aesthetic or sensory, to us in various forms and shapes.