Rag balls

Today has been a good day already..in fact yesterday was rather splendid as well, in a ‘I ticked off the list of things I needed to do’ kind of way rather than in a world event way.  I’ve continued playing with rags and the idea that something discarded can become something new and even precious.

I’ve played a lot with wrapping the rags around different types of spheres and am pleased with the results, pleased enough to keep going in this direction for now. By adding the text the pieces are becoming more scroll like, unraveling a secret or a piece of wisdom. I like this, but experimenting with the type, amount and size of text now.

Rags

Looking back over my artwork I have noticed that I often use material or stitching within the composition, making or stitching together material scraps and paper to form my own material like the piece above, or using important or significant material within the work, like in the piece below which incorporates pieces of my wedding dress material alongside the Terry’s nappies that my Mum placed me in and kept from when I was a baby. I think sometimes you don’t realise a theme in your work unless you revisit and look again at the work created.

I was startled to see how often I use material. Each time the reason for use is different and significant. Recently ideas for artwork have started to form around the use of filthy rags.

The Japanese word ‘boro’ means tattered rags, clothes that have been patched and repatched. It is linked with severe poverty and yet the current fashion ironically incorporates a similar method.

4,000 unwanted babies were left at Foundling Hospital between 1741 and 1760. The mother would often leave a piece of material cut from the clothing she was wearing to serve as a form of identity if she ever wanted to reclaim the child and this material was kept with the hospital’s paperwork for the child.

The sense of identity wrapped up in the clothes we wear or keep for sentimental reasons.

All of these thoughts are linked and yet very separate. No idea where this will lead but ideas are starting to form.

Images below are of past work incorporating material spanning work from 1999 through to last year.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.