November/December 2024
A new pattern and exciting exhibition in Ottawa...
In this newsletter you’ll find:
Studio Views
New pattern! Circus Napkins
Woven Histories - a not-to-be-missed exhibition in Ottawa.
Studio Views
November got away from me, so here we are in December already.
I have bought… a knitting machine?? As if I needed another work adjacent hobby…
I have continued exploring colour; a preoccupation for the last several months. My friends always tease me for choosing the same few hues, but I really love colour and I am trying to pay more attention to how, when, where, and why I use it. My colour experimentations will become apparent as you continue to read this newsletter…
Lastly, I have been teaching a few small workshops here and there. A few weeks ago I taught some friends how to weave bands using a simple heddle, and what with one thing leading to another… on February 19, 2025, I will be teaching a one-night workshop on weaving bands at the Art Gallery of Burlington. Join me by signing up here.
I also taught students how to make cordage through the Sustainable Fashion Initiative at my university — it was so much fun to see fashion students imagine how this process might get used in their garments.
And speaking of the AGB - I’ll also be teaching a quick beginner Weave a Scarf course in January/February (Saturday January 25th, February 1st and 8th). This course is only three weeks long — if you’ve never tried weaving but would like to see what it’s all about, this is a great low-risk option (and fun holiday present too!).
Circus Napkins
It’s been a while since I wrote a new pattern! The Circus Napkins are now available to purchase as a PDF on my website. I’ve been trying to work more drawing into my practice and design development; this pattern started as this drawing…
… and morphed into something related-but-different, which I am calling the Circus Napkins because the very bright colours somehow have me thinking of big tops and I have to call it something more compelling than “napkins.”
Full of stripes and contrasty squares and rectangles, this pattern is great for beginners and experienced weavers alike. They’re just a teeeny tiny bit wider than the usual table loom size (17.5” in the reed — sorry!), but make a nice generous napkin once washed and finished. If you need help adapting them for your loom, email me!
There are three treadling variations I’ve included in the pattern — of course, I always encourage folks to invent their own variations using the same basic building blocks using my Tips & Variations section, which also includes suggestions on different colourways as well as how to expand this project to towel width/length.
I realized about halfway through that my Railroad Runner & Napkins pattern also uses a monks belt threading and I worried I was repeating myself… But in the end, I think this just shows the fun and variety you can have by changing elements like colour, material, and size. There’s a reason these simple and classic threadings endure — the well is bottomless when it comes to reinventing and reworking them.
The Circus Napkins are a relatively quick project and would make a nice present. If you’re interested, please click the button below to visit my website and purchase the PDF.
Woven Histories; Textiles and Modern Abstraction
At the end of November my mum and I went to Ottawa to see Woven Histories; Textiles and Modern Abstraction at the National Gallery of Canada. Textiles and Modernism both seem to be having a moment in the realm of professional art and this exhibition brings together the… interlacements, shall we say, between practice and movement.
Spanning over 70 years of artistic production, over 130 works explore several key areas of practice and mediums like painting (a sublime tiny Agnes Martin!), sculpture, and drawing. There are works included by the heavy hitters you would expect (Anni Albers, Lenore Tawney, Sheila Hicks), but many were by artists previously unknown to me, or, better still, ones whose work I have longed to see in person, like Igshaan Adams, who I mentioned in this newsletter in June 2024.
… Or this piece, (side by side.coats) by Ann Hamilton, from a work/performance for Contextile in Guimarães, Portugal in which she sourced heritage sheep fleeces from a local farmer before felting them to worn woollen coats. About this project she says,
Just as the work of a weaver and a loom is to hold horizontal and vertical threads in balanced tension, cloth is exchanged as a symbol of a social agreement or bond to maintain or forge social concordance. […] The first exchange was with the animal whose sacrifice became our second skin and our first side by side. 1
There are some great learning resources available from one of the previous stops of this exhibition at the National Gallery of Art’s website. Each museum has shown a slightly different collection of artworks — to my disappointment, Olga de Amaral’s Transparencia azul, 1971, which I’d seen in the catalogue, was not included in the NGC’s mounting, drats!
That’s really a very minor disappointment, though — I have many more favourites photographed that I’ll share in January, but, if you can, I strongly suggest visiting Woven Histories at the National Gallery in Ottawa, Ontario, before March 2, 2025 to see this exhibition. It’s next stop is MOMA in NYC, so mark it in your calendars if Ottawa in the depth of winter doesn’t appeal.
Wishing you a wonderful end to 2024,
Amanda
From the artist statement found here: https://www.annhamiltonstudio.com/images/projects/side_by_side/Project_description_Side_by-Side.pdf
As always, this newsletter is a joy. Feeling especially inspired by your colour experimentations. Is the grid in your sketchbook made of cutouts from a magazine?
I, too, saw and loved the Woven Histories exhibit. I saw it at the National Gallery of Art in Washington DC last March. I liked it so much that I went back a second time 1in the early summer before it closed. My favorites were the many Anni Albers weavings and her design drawings. I also loved Ruth Asawa’s wire woven baskets. I thought the exhibit did a truly effective job of tracing textile weaving from its roots, through the Industrial Age to becoming artistic pieces, and also in showing how woven textiles have affected those who made them in order to earn a living. The photos of the factory worker whose body & spine were affected by daily hours of weaving was striking.
Like Amanda, I recommend seeing this exhibit if you can. It’s lovely, artistic, & educational. It’s also a good length and has defined purposes in what the designers wanted to convey. I sometimes get saturated when I go to large art museums.