13 Nov 2008
<p>Two Wellington artists - Wendy Randall of Vincents Art Workshop and Athina Moisa of Pablos Art Studio - are exhibiting their work in Auckland for the first time at a new exhibition at Objectspace from 15 November to 20 December.</p>
Two Wellington artists - Wendy Randall of Vincents Art Workshop and Athina Moisa of Pablos Art Studio - are exhibiting their work in Auckland for the first time at a new exhibition at Objectspace from 15 November to 20 December.
"A show of non-conformist stitchers" is how curator Rosemary McLeod describes her new show, No Rules: Rediscovering Embroidery, which features the work of 18 artists from around the country.
"With this exhibition, I was looking for artists who use embroidery in new and creative ways," Rosemary says. "Wendy and Athina are great examples of artists working outside the formal, traditional constraints of stitching.
"I was attracted to Wendy's work because of the stories it tells about her life, her family and her memories. Athina has an energetic, painterly style, and I love the way she uses very vigorous large stitches and bright colours."
Wendy's work is a wall hanging entitled Journey. She's been attending Vincents Art Workshop since the early 1990s and started doing embroidery on hessian four years ago.
"I remember my mother and grandmother making things like aprons, peg bags and oven cloths out of sugar bags and decorating them with embroidery or scraps of material."
At school, she learned to do cross stitch on sugar bags, which are a form of hessian. "And so I've created something new and innovative by using a traditional craft."
For both artists, the exhibition is an opportunity to show their work in a mainstream gallery and to a new audience.
Athina's work in the exhibition is a tapestry called Hills and Houses. She has knitted all her life but started creating wool tapestries when she came to Pablos Art Studio three years ago.
"I'm very interested in the idea of creating work about happy communities and I hope people get a nice feeling when they see my work," she says.
For Athina, wool is both a practical medium and a metaphor for a welcoming community. "It's like putting on a woolly jumper. You feel like you're in a warm, soft and comfortable environment."
Other artists whose work features in No Rules: Rediscovering Embroidery are Amanda A'Hara, JB Bones, Seb Clarke, Tori Ferguson, Megan Hansen-Knarhoi, Annie Mackenzie, Angela Meyer, Katherine Morrison, Diana Parkes, Rachelle Pedersen, Shona Rapira Davies, Rose Marie Salmon, Jo Torr, Ronnie van Hout, Rosie White and Roxanna Zamani.
Rosemary McLeod is an expert in the field of textiles and the author of the award-winning book, Thrift to Fantasy: Home Textile Crafts of the 1930s-1950s.
Objectspace is a dedicated centre for craft and design at 8 Ponsonby Rd, Auckland. Rosemary McLeod will talk about the exhibition at 11am on Saturday 15 November.
Objectspace receives funding from Creative New Zealand.
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