Oh … it has been so, so, so long

Seriously, embarrassingly long … so much so, that I don’t even know where to start.

Much has happened … and not happened, and then happened again.

And the world marches on whether I am blogging about my exploits or not.

But, I have not been idle.

I have spent the last year playing with a new exhibition concept with my sister-in-law Marg Knight (you may or may not remember that she and I created the 5000 Poppies Project together 10 years ago now, although we still manage to “plant” a poppy installation around special times of remembrance to this day). But we have evolved … and now we are about to mount our very first gallery exhibition together … we’ve called it Embracing Grey … both for the colour choices we have made for the work, but it probably is more of a narrative on the time of life we find ourselves enjoying.

Marg and I are very different in our approach to our art practice … but we agreed that we would (as much as possible) rely heavily on materials to hand (COVID lockdowns played a huge role in that decision), as well as recycled, repurposed, gifted and thrifted materials … and for the most part we were successful. One aim was to use our abundant stash(es) as a starting point … and when I say abundant I mean truly abundant.

So Marg’s work focusses on eco-dyeing, stitching, fabric and fibre manipulation and mine focusses more on knitting and crochet, fabric and fibre manipulation, some weaving, felting, stitching and beading … and for this exercise, embellishing the many, many collected sticks I accumulated from storm damaged trees during lockdown 2021 and to a lesser extent 2022.

Some works are joint efforts … others are individually made. Some new, some old techniques and a whole lot of learning. We have worked on cohesion using a colour theme, and I think it has worked incredibly well.

It has been a lot of fun, and a bit of a challenge but we made it.

So we will be at Meeniyan Gallery 84 Whitelaw Street, Meeniyan Vic (Australia) from 1-27 February 2023 alongside two other fabulous textile artists Dijanne Cevaal (Origidij) and Chris Beehag.

A “meet the makers” event will be held on Sunday 12 February from 2pm to 4pm if you’d like to come along to chat to any of us about our work. There will be some fabulously interesting pieces on display for inspiration and purchase.

Hope to see you there.