Weaving
Artist Statement
I am a self-taught textile artist working mainly with heritage-breed British wool from Lancashire, Yorkshire, Cumbria, and Shetland – supporting sustainable agriculture, family farms, and local businesses. I take a meditative and intuitive approach, designing on the loom as much as possible and taking inspiration from the colours, textures and forms of my local landscape.
My weaving is influenced by the Zen approach of Misao Jo; the Bauhaus principles of Anni and Josef Albers; and the determined anti-disciplinarity of Sheila Hicks and Magdalena Abakanowicz. I embrace inefficiency and opt for slowness over the mandates of productivity culture. I mainly use a rigid heddle loom and handheld tapestry looms, welcoming the liberatory capacity of their limited possibilities.
My choice to make art with small looms that fit easily in domestic spaces is also an act of feminist praxis – rejecting the notion that art is something sacred and apart, and instead allowing it to be secular and fully intertwined with the messiness of everyday life, breakfast dishes on the table and children playing on the floor beneath the loom.
