Late one night in April 2021, after spending another evening on the sofa mindlessly scrolling while my husband pulled a late shift, bored of being a stay at home mum (FYI this has changed, but more on that later), itching to do something, anything to break up the monotony of lockdown life, I made the conscious decision to crack open the door of the room where my inner artist had resided since I last studied and created art for my LEaving Certificate at 18. The rest as they say, is history!
I’ve always taken the realistically logical path, channelling my naturally curious nature in a way that would yield results. I studied Engineering. I mean, what better way is there to satisfy a curious mind than to learn how the cogs of the world turn?
But as time went by, I wanted more. Coupled with the big, bad pandemic that left us with heaps of time to rifle through our minds, the birth of my third child, relocating from Dubai back to the UK, family health trauma and being a stay at home mum for the first time, I realised that I wanted to be more than just practical.
I let the wildly optimistic dreamer that had been muted by life free.
Why Textile Art, I hear you ask?
I’m a very tactile person.
I adore texture.
I love colour.
I’ve always had an affinity with textiles. Long after I stopped making art, I continued knitting for myself. For me, textile art was an obvious starting point.
And weaving?
Well……when I weave, the world disappears. I get lost in the slow, meditative, over/under movement of weaving on a loom. It stills my inner critic, it allows my mind to wander, it brings me a sense of peace. The wildness of the world intrigues me and I’m inspired to recreate this through weaving. I delight in finding the small hidden details, the extraordinary that can be found in the ordinary, if you just make the time to look for it. I’ve come to realise that the only thing we really have is the PRESENT. I don’t want to live my life waiting for an imagined future to arrive. I won’t stifle my dreamer anymore. It’s her turn to shine!
This is for the dreamers….
My greatest wish is that my art allows you to experience a sense of soothing peace, that you lose yourself in the woven landscape, that you fall in love with your dreams again.
Fast forward to today, and things have changed. I’m working part time again (as an Engineer). I’m not ready to give that up. My art doesn’t support me and my family financially (YET!). We need to eat, pay bills and live life! So I weave when I can. Sometimes it’ll be into the wee hours of the morning, during increasingly less frequent naps, while my boys are playing together, on the sofa in front of the tv. For now, art cannot take centre stage in my life. And that’s ok, it’s taken a while for me to accept that my practical side has its uses - she won’t let me indulge in the starving artist persona! The important thing here is that I’ve made space in my life for creating dream art that represents me - my emotions and life experiences, and I’m sharing it with the world.
Have I intrigued you?
Are you now wondering what textile art is all about? If the answer to that is a resounding YES, then come take a look at my corner of the universe. Go on, you know you want to!
