Tapestry Musings

This is the British Tapestry Group's blog. Topics range across a broad spectrum of subjects including reflections, questions, proposals, issues and ideas all loosely connected with tapestry weaving and tapestry art. Contributors are drawn from both within the British Tapestry Group and from outside it. There is also a facility for those reading the Tapestry Musings to share their ideas and views on posts via comments, generating interesting discussions. Posting into Tapestry Musings is by invitation - if you would like to make a contribution please contact us at blog@thebritishtapestrygroup.co.uk

The 'Hanging' of a Tapestry

26th November 2024

In creating the Edinburgh Seven Tapestry, artist Christine Borland, and the Dovecot weavers collaborated closely to realise a striking, multidimensional work. However, the manner in which the tapestry was subsequently hung at both the V&A and now, at its permanent home at the Edinburgh Futures Institute, seems to have diminished its impact. Curators play a vital role in ensuring the final manner of display delivers the very best vision of a tapestry. Should they be brought in at an earlier stage and contribute to the overall development of a work?

(5 comments)

How not to design a tapestry?

1st August 2024

Just because a renowned artist has created the design for a tapestry, does that make the resulting work a well-designed tapestry?

(12 comments)

Weaving a way through grief.

30th April 2024

In November 2022, Rebecca Clark sent us details of a tapestry weaving project she had just started, in memory of her husband, whom she lost to pancreatic cancer in 2020. She said "To raise awareness of the symptoms of Pancreatic Cancer this Pancreatic Cancer Awareness Month I’m starting a tapestry project, using pick and pick (demi duite), that will display 9,973 woven candles, one for every individual lost to Pancreatic Cancer in the UK in 2020. One candle will be unique, to commemorate my lovely husband and act as a reminder that every candle represents an individual who was loved and lost too soon". The tapestry is now complete and has been selected for Heallreaf 5. In this blog post, Rebecca not only recalls the process of developing the tapestry but also reflects on the impact both the weaving process and the completion of the tapestry have had on her.

(2 comments)

Untitled, unattributed

31st March 2024

How does one look at a publicly hung artwork that has no name, title or artist’s statement? This makes us passive viewers. Artworks are labelled for our benefit encouraging us first to peer intently at what’s written on the card beside the work we should be focusing on. The name of the artist gives us a starting point — Monet, a name we know, ‘Waterlillies’, tick, we look and move on like twitchers ticking off a list of must-see birds. But what if there are no titles or names? How should we react?

(2 comments)

Tapestry weaving - a collaborative activity?

5th September 2023

Tapestry weaving is a highly personal, creative process. Can it be enhanced through collaboration and, if so, what might the success factors of building tapestry weaving communities be?

Image: Members of the Scottish Regional Group at a meeting in August 2023