In this new showcase I’m featuring four Modern Quilters that you will love!
Masami Akatsuka
I’m Masami, a japanese woman who lives in France for 25 years, mother of two. Recently I moved in a mountain villege where I feel so good!
I have been creating in a way or another. So as my child grow up, it has naturally become my work. I started working by crafting objects which were meant to be reproduce : @cocon.etc
Currently I focus on making one of a kinds, especially in collaboration with Whole (studio in Paris, making vegetable dye) : @a.m.etc
That way, I feel more free to express myself and I have fu
I don’t consider myself as very skilled. But I have greatly developped my sensibility when I was in the fashion school and at fine arts school. Beauty of nature inspires me, but anything can. Any kind of art, memories, images, scents etc.. become like a dust of idea that moves me.
Claire Guigal
First memory of a textile art creation: I’m 4 or 5, seating at a table. One of my mother’s dress is laid upon it. She’s just finished to sew the hem and she let it there while preparing to go out. I’m looking at this gorgeous green dress and the big scissors next to it. And I think: “This dress could be soooo more beautiful with a greek frieze at the bottom” (yes, we love everything greek in my family, this is crazy…). Story says that returning from their evening party where my mother discovered the disaster of my customization, my father woke me up to yell at me. I don’t have any memory of that… But I clearly remember the weight of the scissors in my little hand, the feeling of making something beautiful… and this exciting thrill to deeply know that it was absolutely forbidden.
I resumed my work as a textile artist few years ago, trying different techniques and fibers. But when I discovered quilting and appliquéd methods I knew it was my dope! Appliquéd is like collage, quilting like drawing, choosing the harmony of colors like painting and sewing this together is like sculpting.
My mother taught me the basis of sewing when I was a teenager. My sisters have a real skill for everything textile… I’ve also learned online and from a lot of tries and mistakes…
I don’t use machines, only my hands. I like to see the handmade work in the design with the slight variations between the stiches, making it more lively. I use only french or european linen (old and new ones) and recycled wadding.
Abstract art moves me and I don’t know exactly why. My inspiration comes from my huge pantheon of designers, painters, sculptors. It can also come from vintage toys, kids books, traditional crafts, scientific graphics…
Textile Art is historically a woman’s art. This is also why I always was very interested in. I try to learn everyday something about this art, its history and its artists. Because I think it’s a Major Art.
And you may have guessed: my favorite color is still green, since my first textile experimentation…
Lizzie Kimbley
Hello. I’m Lizzie. I’m a textile artist and weaver based in Norfolk, UK. I work with woven textiles, natural dyes and basketry techniques to create contemporary artworks exploring responsible design and connection to nature and place. I’ve always loved textiles: the colour, pattern and tactility as well as the meaning and making behind the cloth.
I studied textile design at Norwich University of the Arts where I was introduced to weave. I was hooked! I love all the processes involved in weaving and the endless possibilities offered when designing cloth from scratch. After gaining an MA in Textile Design, I set up my studio at the end of 2019.
Materials are always the starting point for my work. Conscious of the volume of waste sent to landfill and the need to value our natural resources, I only use natural materials so they can be recovered or will biodegrade. I often repurpose materials leftover from other design processes; surplus and redundant mill stock as well as materials such as willow tips from a local furniture designer-maker or linen offcuts from a local clothing designer-maker that I piece together to create hand-stitched wall- based work.
Inspired by my surroundings I also use gathered materials to create works with a narrative of place that capture a sense of the calm and quiet that can be found in nature. Walking in the beautiful Norfolk landscape, I gather plants for natural dye and basketry work. Recent work is a collection of basketry pieces made in response to walking and gathering in the grounds and gardens at Blickling Hall in Norfolk. Materials such as daffodil, crocosmia and iris leaves are gathered, dried and made into cordage that is then woven into textured nest-like forms. I’m excited to develop these further in the coming year.
Jordan Cunliffe
I have always had an avid interest in textile art, something cemented when I did my BA in Embroidery at Manchester School of Art from 2009-2012. But it wasn’t until I completed my MA in Textiles in 2017 that I really began my current practice, data visualisation in textiles. I love combining traditional textile techniques with the contemporary concept of data visualisation, and using this as a method of personal storytelling.
I like to take small, seemingly insignificant details of daily life, and honour them through the meticulous art of hand embroidery, especially working with more intangible ideas such as feeling and memory and making them tangible through stitch.
I wrote my book ‘Record, Map & Capture in Textile Art’ to share this way of working and encourage others to look for the data stories in their lives.
I tend to use the same basic stitches in my work, running stitches and cross stitches, in a limited palette, this is because the outcome of the stitches is often a by-product of the work. Is it the process of the stitching, and the story behind it, that is the main creative element for me.
I enjoy the act of collecting the data, looking for patterns and stories, and then finding the most efficient and effective way of sharing this information. Working in this way allows me to share very personal information, privately. The methodical and structured aspect of this work appeals to my organised personality.
Some of the data I like to work with revolves around time, mapping, routine and memory. Usually this data is pulled from my own life, only very occasionally from the lives of others.