Exhibition celebrating the work of weavers in Wales

I have just learnt about a current exhibition at the National Wool Museum of Wales, on until 8th January: Warp and Weft 2 - from handloom to production. This coincides with another superb event at the Oriel Myrddin Gallery in Carmarthen,Warp + weft, contemporary woven textiles, which features work by the following weavers - Peter Collingwood, Sue Hiley Harris, Ainsley Hillard, Makeba Lewis, Lucy McMullen, Ptolemy Mann, Ann Richards, Ismini Samanidou in collaboration with Gary Allson, Kathy Schicker, Reiko Sudo, Ann Sutton, Hiroko Takeda, Laura Thomas, Priti Veja.

Time to plan a trip to Wales?

Ismini Samanidou - art weaver

Shani has discovered this wonderful weaver before me! Do read her excellent blog post.

I was listening to Radio 4 this morning and there, on the travel programme Excess Baggage, Sandy Toskvig (who it turns out weaves on a 4 shaft loom) was talking to weaver Ismini Samanidou, this is a quote from the Excess baggage web page: "about her travels from Mexico to Malaysia and from North Carolina to North Vietnam, looking at different kinds of weaving, the fables behind the fabrics and discovering what a pepper pattern can say about your mother-in-law."

There had a lovely conversation about weaving and the wonder of turning a thread into cloth. I was hoping that this programme would be available to "listen again" on the Radio 4 website, but it isn't at the moment. Something I particularly enjoyed about the programme is the modesty of this weaver, who was talking of the wonder of weaving and the weaving of people different cultures, not about herself although she is a talented and successful weaver so her personality did not obstruct the message.

However, I will talk about this weaver's own work and tell you that Ismini trained as a textile designer at the Royal College of Art and the reason she visited North Carolina is that she had designed a piece of art weaving that was being made on a Jacquard loom at the Oriole Mill in North Carolina, and this piece of work is being exhibited in London at the Jerwood Space 10th June to 19th July, and goes to Dovecot Studios in Edinburgh for August & September. There's more about the weaving exhibition (including some pictures) on this website: http://www.isminisamanidou.com/

I found more about her at: http://www.hiddenartcornwall.com/designermakers/textiles/isminisamanidou

And on this gallery website, where there are some good pictures, but to find them you have to first click on the text which is too small to read (this makes it zoom up to readable size) then there is another link: http://www.willslanegallery.co.uk/weaving.htm

I found some biographical stuff:

Ismini Samanidou, born in Greece 1977
1996-97 Camberwell College of Arts Foundation Studies in Art & Design
1997-2000 Central Saint Martins, B.A. (Hons) Textiles
2001-3 Royal College of Art, M.A. in Constructed Textiles.

Tabby and twill

This blanket is one of a small collection we have woven by Keith Stow, a weaver living in Sowerby Bridge, Yorkshire, who I understand finally retired about 3 years ago. I wish I'd bought more of his beautiful blankets! I also love wearing a couple of hooded jackets sewn up from a similar fabric to the blankets. All 100 per cent wool. The label he wove under was "Stows of Sowerby". I have an old "Craft Trail" booklet for the south Pennines with a page about the business. Keith Stow had worked as a spinning overlooker until he was made redundant in 1980. He and his wife were living in a farmhouse with a large barn, suitable for setting up his weaving business. It is my understanding from a conversation I had with the intermediary I bought the blankets from - at a Derbyshire crafts centre - that he started hand weaving, but the popularity of the blankets was such that it justified getting a large Italian mechanical loom, and in fact the craft booklet says he had three working looms. It was discovering these blankets - I think probably 8 years ago - that caused me first to look at a woven cloth and wonder about how it was designed and made. The Craft Trail booklet tells me that they are based on a blanket that Keith's wife, April, inherited from a Swiss grandfather. They are a bit different to anything I had ever seem before. They are woven in 4/4 diagonal twill and fulled. The weft colours are in bands, the blanket above has five different weft colours but an extraordinary number and range of colours in the warp. I think it probably that he used production line ends from local mills.

Plain weaves with quality threads

It's a coincidence that there's been a few significant changes in my life at the start of 2009. Mostly not related to my fibre / weaving interests, so I'll just mention in passing that the start of a new working hours and different work locations last week kept me from writing about the many things I'm thinking about and working on in my 'spare' time.

So, where shall I start? Not with the new loom. I'll just say for those of you who haven't heard yet I have a new (extra) weaving loom and am very pleased with it. More on that another time when I can get my photos uploaded.

I was wondering where to start writing about the different subjects of different books I've been reading, I was thinking that I'd been following several lines of investigation at once, then I looked at the pile of books again and they re-arranged themselves in my mind. I see the connection, it's in my title, plain weaves and interesting, quality yarns.

I'm interested in the history of handweaving and different national traditions.

I have found that broadly speaking these differences in the 20th century handweaving traditions I have been reading about:

- the US tends to favour jack looms, overshot, plain yarns and at times very complex weave patterns,
- from Scandinavia I see countermarch or counterbalance looms, more high tension warps such as linen and the distinctive weaves such as rep,
- in the UK I have found more tradition of balanced plain and twill weaves, wool yarns and tweeds, and then fancy yarns in these weaves (see my earlier post about Bernat Klein).

Taking the UK, I read some time ago Theo Moorman's autobiography Weaving as an Art Form, a personal statement, published Van Nostrand Reinhold Company, 1975, and last year I added to my understanding of her life and work with Theo Moorman 1907-1990: her life and work as an artist weaver, edited by Hilary Diaper, published University Gallery Leeds 1992, ISBN 1 874331 01 4 (hardback) and 1 874331 002 2 (softback). Theo Moorman worked largely by creating designs in plain weave cloth with inlaid yarns.

I rediscovered Theo Moorman once more in Fine-Art Weaving, by Irene Waller, published by Batsford, 1979, along with other weavers of the late 20th C. The work of some of the others looks very dated and "70s" to me (I do know this is currently fashionable, but I recall the 1970s). A few stand the test of time very well - such as the amazing Peter Collingwood. In the introduction, the background of early 20th C British weavers is given, and I found a tantalizing, but short biography of Ethel Mairet (1872-1952).

Nigel, a fan of Ethel Mairet, directed me to A Weaver's Life: Ethel Mairet 1872-1952, Margot Coatts, published by the Crafts Council, 1983, ISBN 0 903798 70 0. Here I found links in attitude to cloth design that reminded me of Bernat Klein - simple weave (she used plain weave, he used simple twills) and an interest in yarn. I quote Margot Coatts (p.82)

"Ethel Mairet's approach to weaving was that it should be an intuitive and expressive response to the colour and texture of the yarn",

and Margot herself (p.104) quotes the representative of Greg's yarn spinning mill, who later created yarns for Ethel, saying that he:

..."very soon realised she was not a weaver, not a designer, but a yarn enthusiast - not just for the look of a yarn but also in the feel".

Inspired by weavers she had met in Ceylon (Sri Lanka), Ethel Mairet started her weaving workshop using handspun yarns. Later Greg's of Stockport created characterful yarn for her such as a fine cotton snarl yarn which she coloured with natural dyes.

Now to move into a totally different part of the world, but more handspun yarns used by handweavers on simple looms to create the most beautiful cloth.

Last autumn I very much enjoyed seeing Kente cloth in the permanent exhibition at Bankfield Museum, Halifax. About the same time Syne Mitchell wrote about Kente cloth in Weavezine, Fall 2008, she referenced "African Textiles" by John Picton and John Mack. I now have two, different editions of this book. =Sigh=

I borrowed from the local library (by request, for 80p) the second edition, which I highly recommend:
African Textiles, John Picton and John Mack, published 1989 by The Trustees of the British Museum, ISBN 0-7141-1595-9. Discovering it to be an invaluable reference, I ordered a book I found on www.abebooks.co.uk, only to discover that I had ordered the first edition, published in 1979. The second edition has much more material, both writing and photos. So, I found a second edition and ordered that too. It's getting late and if I start telling you how much I like this book I'll be still tapping the keys into early tommorrow a.m., best leave that for now. However, there goes my book buying budget for up to March. Yep, this year I have set myself a budget with monthly amounts and aim to spend less on books -
this is to compensate for buying The New Loom - I'll tell you about that someday soon, with photos!!