We have been collecting personal stories and images of dress and textiles with value and meaning to their owners.
Sharing stories through clothing and textiles
Many of these relate to personal and collective identities, histories, and memories.
We are also interested in these textiles as material objects that themselves move across geopolitical places and as such, we are interested in tracing their journeys — although not necessarily along the same enquiry lines to that of their owners.
Through our call for entries, @patterns_of_migration, we have been collecting personal stories, testimonials and images of dress and textiles objects which have value and meaning to their owners. Many of these relate to personal and collective identities, histories, and memories.
Working with archive and museum collections: we are working with the curators and outreach worker from the Gawthorpe Textile Collection (GTC). Alongside our interest in personal narratives collected on Instagram, we are also interested in how textiles end up in collections, the stories behind these and how they can become re-activated through storytelling as part of collective memory and identity.
Workshops
‘Being Human’: Saturday 13th & Saturday 20th. A series of 3-4 x workshops that will include the following activities:
•Introduction to the project with a workshop focusing on selected textile objects from the Gawthorpe Textiles Collection (GTC). We will explore social and cultural histories of these pieces through sound, movement and making also in the context of the participants’ own biographical and sensory histories and ideas. Our aim is to explore how new values, narratives and meanings can be created and understood through community participation and interaction with collections.
•We will invite local women and groups as well as refugee and asylum seeker women groups to bring a textile piece or a photograph of an item that holds personal significance. Facilitated by a professional musician and storyteller, this interactive workshop will encourage participants to create and perform stories around their selected textile objects.
There will be a blend of making/crafting techniques. The aim is for each participant to create a unique textile sample in response to the previous workshop activities. Outcomes from the three workshops will be showcased in both an online and as a physical exhibition, including audio voice narratives and other sounds captured in the workshops, alongside still and moving image and material artefacts.
This project aims to:
• Create a safe space for local women including refugee and asylum seeker women to meet.
• Enable participants to build a peer support network, make friends, learn and share textile knowledge and skills.
• Provide an opportunity to engage in creative and practical activities and develop skills.
• Introduce participants to local history and culture including the Gawthorpe Textiles Collection, an internationally renowned collection of global textiles located near Burnley in the heart of Pennine Lancashire.
Outcomes:
By taking part in our activities we hope that we will offer a safe space, the opportunity to make new friends and a way out of loneliness and isolation for local women whilst nurture the notion of belonging to a broader local community. At the same time, we would love to see participants exchange knowledge as well as learn and develop new skills. Lastly, to introduce women to the Gawthorpe Textiles Collection as a local ‘hidden gem’ that is accessible for everyone and which is embedded inf local history and culture.
Intended audience:
local women as well as local refugee and asylum seeker women groups from across East Lancashire.
Being Human
Saturday 13th & Saturday 20th. A series of 3-4 x workshops that will include the following activities: