Please come to an exhibition of work by
East London Textile Arts and The McGrath Makers at
Prick Your Finger,
on Friday September 27th 6-9 pm.
Pictured above is Arthur's embroidered portait of Dr. Who. Arthur suffers from autism, and has embroidered all twleve doctors whilst working with East London Textile Arts.
Donald's Fish drawing has even more movement when you see it for real. These two pieces are a taster of the much bigger collection produced by the McGrath Makers. The projects undoubtedly give the participants purpose and develop their skills, but for us the viewer, we will see that concentration, repetition, determination, peace, and simple materials are all we need to make beautiful textiles.
East London Textile Arts is run by Celia Ward, and her inspiring team. The project was made in partnership with London Borough of Newham Community Services, Skill and Support. For a more detailed press release, scroll down to the words in green.
The McGrath makers will be at Prick Your Finger in the afternoon installing their works if you would like to meet them, otherwise the main view of works will be in the evening, when you will all be most welcome.
Please tell us if you can come, or just suprise us...
Textiles will never be the same again at,
Prick Your Finger, 260 Globe Rd, London E2 0JD 020 8981 2560 Bethnal Green tube, no. 8 bus.
Recently, the hugely successful exhibition Souzou at the Wellcome highlighted two ways in which art has developed among ‘outsiders’, or those on the margins of society. The term ‘Outsider Art’ was coined in the mid-twentieth century to describe the art of self-taught ‘outsiders’ which was uncontaminated by culture and the art world. Much of this was found in psychiatric hospitals and adults with some form of mental disability. A somewhat different approach is found in Japan, where institutions of social care were set up after 1945 by the government to foster and develop artistic talent.
This project builds on the concept of Outsider Art: that artwork of aesthetic and intrinsic value is produced by untrained people. However, it broadens the term ‘artist’ from a limited minority to all people; that is to say, this project affirms that anyone can produce artworks that are worthy of exhibition.
Unlike the Outsider Art principle of ‘purity’ uncompromised by external interference, The project is more structured and institutional. There are weekly two hour textile classes for adults with learning and physical difficulties, held in partnership with day care services across Newham. The environment created by these classes means that the project is naturally a communal effort, with people helping and learning from each other. Yet, the project goes further: it is not just a collection of individual embroideries, imbued with an abstract, indeterminate ‘collectivity’; it is an active collaboration between embroiderer and support worker, between adults with learning difficulties and trained textile workers. There is a constant partnership at each class between those who choose the thread and those who cut the thread, those who thread the needle and those who pull the needle, those who draw the design and those who embroider the design. At each stage of the embroidery the artist has complete autonomy over the design and its embellishment, and is helped to complete it. Finally, the finished embroideries are put together into one hanging by the workers on the project, who arrange and attach the pieces onto a cloth and then back it. Individual, communal and collaborative: the hanging is all three, and cannot be categorised under one label.
What distinguishes this project from more traditional approaches to occupational therapy is education. Rather than simply encouraging expression (in the romantic sense), the aim is to teach the participants traditional, and often universal, techniques of embroidery and textiles. Each person is taught to sew when they join the project, though some have already learnt from their families. Although mostly restricted to running stitch alone, this has been explored further by teaching the Bengali tradition of Kantha (rows of parallel running stitch, arranged so as to create a rippling effect). In contrast to the Outsider Art ideal of nature opposed to culture, this project draws on the varied cultural heritage of all participants, and seeks to broaden it by exploring and building on unknown cultural traditions.
Each participant thus learns new skills, or develops those they already have. Concentration and co-ordination are slowly improved in little ways, and the intensity with which these embroideries are made is an impressive, almost inimitable, experience. The enjoyment and spirit of creativity found in the sessions which produced these works of art displays the dedication and commitment of all involved.
In the past year there has been a radical change in the way that services for adults with learning difficulties are delivered. East London Textile Arts will continue to provide textile classes, but from the autumn of 2013 this will be as part of Newham’s ‘enterprise and training zone’, which prepares adults with learning difficulties for employment. As a micro-enterprise, adults with learning difficulties will act as classroom assistants and there will be an effort to increase sales of cards, decorated papers and other merchandise to craft shops, galleries, and in local community open days. Further developments in the project will see greater collaboration between participants and skilled textile groups, and a wider range of materials (introducing wool, for example).
We would like this exhibition to be the start of a wider project bringing together different textile projects which work with adults with learning difficulties. The aim is to pool knowledge, establish best practice, and make all information easily accessible online for people wanting to start similar projects, starting with a list of existing projects. We welcome and invite projects in this area to join this database.
