Members are reminded that ‘Eclectica’ who include members of BETA, are exhibiting at Forge Mill Needle Museum. The last day is on Saturday 26th November 2023 when you can also meet the makers. A member also recommended a pop up yarn shop in the Great Western Arcade.
Claire brought along a variety of her work to share with the meeting and talked through her stitching journey and her approach to textiles. Her education included fine art and print making and she also developed an interest in free machine embroidery. She developed her work using painting, but also mixed media with a variety of textiles and objects embroidered with both machine and hand embroidery.
She talked us through a variety of inspirations for her work, including a piece inspired by the suffrage movement ‘sewing seeds of equality no shrinking violets here”. She drew on the hats that were typical of the period with the suffragette and suffragist colours and including old jet and a large sewing needle as a hat pin. A piece pictured below unites her interest in women’s issues, with environmental concerns, and features Professor Wangari Maathai, who started the green belt movement in Kenya.
Continuing the environmental theme Claire has produced work about the impact of palm oil production. The pieces, again shown below, involve a variety of items sewn onto organza stretched in a hoop with layers being built up. She used hand dyed silk chiffon to represent flames, although she generally doesn’t dye her own fabrics. Another piece included here is based on the Malaysian Frog. Sometimes she is also inspired by the fabric itself. She does not have a set style, because she learns from each piece. She has also included some felting and free form crochet.
Claire is now on a path exploring weaving and has dyed wool with lichens and onion skins. This was a fascinating and inspiring talk and Claire encouraged us also to look at her work in detail . She can be found on instagram as @cooperwalsh.
We also had our usual raffle, this time silver. Some of the stitching on the bags completed by Margaret and Jayne is shown below.
Our December meeting on 11th December is the Christmas party with gold raffle bags. Analiza Jones with talk about handbags from the Philipines. Please bring raffle contributions. The committee will provide savoury and sweet treats, so save some room and don’t forget to bring your entries for the competition.
Birmingham Embroidery and Textile Art 