Threads and Yarns: a day of craft, conversation, health and wellbeing
13 July 2011
More than 200 flowers have been created on hand-held looms in a series of workshops of communal crafting and conversation at the V&A, and these yarn motifs will be arranged into a single artwork to be exhibited during a special day of talks and craft sessions at the museum on Monday 18 July.
The artwork will be animated by audio recordings of exchanges from the workshops, embedded within the yarn flowers - whose wide variety of forms, from humble single-layered designs to spectacular multicoloured sculptural pieces, reflect the diversity of the participants. In talks throughout the day, visitors will be able to hear from seniors and students from Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design, who contributed to the project.
In addition, medical and public health historians from the Wellcome Trust's network of researchers will discuss biomedical issues raised by the project. There will also be opportunities for everyone to try their hand at craft skills, with sessions on flower making with Japanese yarns, crochet, and stitch sampling based on works from the V&A's collections.
The series of workshops was designed to encourage informal discussion about changes in healthcare, drawing on the historic connection between crafts, storytelling and shared experience: from women's quilting groups and workers in textiles factories to today's 'stitch and bitch' sessions and artists joining to knit together in political action. Many of the seniors participating recalled life before the advent of the NHS, and subjects covered included childbirth, nutrition, mental health, attitudes to drugs, body image and the medical profession.
Amy Sanders, Special Projects Manager at the Wellcome Trust, says: "The last 75 years has seen war-time rationing, the birth of NHS, the contraceptive pill, heart transplants, hip replacements and the human genome project. Threads and Yarns is a wonderful opportunity to hear the stories of people who have lived through these changes in health care, medicine and research, and to reflect on how they have impacted on us all."
Jo Morrison, Digital Projects Director at Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design, says: "Threads and Yarns demonstrates how craft can function both as a subject in itself, and as a means to stage an encounter in order to reveal stories - social, cultural, economic and political. In this case craft has enabled personal encounters between people who would not ordinarily have the chance to meet one another, nor share personal histories."
Threads and Yarns runs from 10.00 to 17.00 on Monday 18 July in the V&A's Sackler Centre and is free to all. Booking is required on 020 7942 2211. A full brochure for the event can be downloaded at the ‘Threads and Yarns’ page on the Wellcome Trust website.
Image: Yarn flowers. Credit: Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design.
