African textile exhibit at the British Museum
Damien Hirst, Livings Eternal Joyful Happiness, 2006I am interested in exploring humanity’s relationship with nature from a spiritual perspective. I like the idea of blending elements of nature with the materials of human lives, and using natural elements to tell human stories.
I would like to continue my use of stained glass- perhaps making a stained glass window that incorporates organic material. I envision it using something like pressed flowers or seaweed as the window’s colour, similar to the way Damien Hirst used butterflies in his pieces. It would be good to make a large piece, however there would be practical restraints in creating the piece. A larger stained glass piece requires using leading and heavy soldering and would be more difficult to transport and install due to its weight. I could consider creating smaller panels that fit together in a frame instead- I would need to experiment to see if this were practical.
I was also inspired by some embroidered textile pieces I saw in the African section of the British Museum that depict people interacting with the natural elements. I like this pictorial method of storytelling and I would like to experiment with using textiles in a similar way, and depict people’s experiences in nature. I could try using the college’s embroidery machine to transfer designs onto fabric, but I would also like to see if there were other ways of achieving it, perhaps using natural, foraged or found materials.
Thirdly, I was thinking about my own memories of places and how the landscape shaped their meaning to me. I was thinking about my interactions with locations from my childhood, and whether I could recreate them in a way that would allow others to see them in the same way. I think this would involve visiting the location to gather resource materials. I would then use the gallery space to allude to the natural elements.