Concerned with the adverse global impact of the textile industry, extant textiles are transformed into artwork through mixed media techniques and fabric manipulation. Discarded clothes and domestic furnishings have new life breathed into them via transformative techniques both historical and contemporary, lessening textile wastage and creating reinvented cloth for a variety of purposes.
‘Heartcloth’ is an exploration into function and process where the original purpose of textile is disregarded and the ingenuity of the artist comes to the fore.
Before the advent of mass production, textiles were a treasured and valuable commodity where fabrics were used and reused to destruction. Inspired by the historical practices of patchwork quilt making and boro, disparate textiles are reunified and transformed to create a new whole, to perform a new function. By taking discarded textiles and reusing them in new artworks I am promoting the ethos of ‘make do and mend’ by using what we already have to create anew, thereby reducing the amount of textile wastage and its adverse global impact.
This ethical stance has developed through my study of textiles at university, where I became aware of the historical production and use of textiles. These studies highlighted the changed attitude toward textiles due to the industrial revolution, when fabric became mass produced, cheaper and widely available. This paradigm shift has resulted in overproduction and wastage, leaving a swathe of destruction in its wake. Ultimately I hope to highlight this wastefulness and inspire others to ‘make do and mend’, to make the fullest use of the resources that we already have.
Gyda phryder am effaith niweidiol fyd-eang y diwydiant tecstilau, caiff tecstilau sy’n bodoli eu trawsnewid i waith celf drwy dechnegau amlgyfrwng ac addasu ffabrig. Drwy dechnegau trawsnewidiol hanesyddol a chyfoes, caiff hen ddillad a dodrefn tŷ fywyd newydd, gan leihau gwastraff tecstilau a chreu brethyn o’r newydd ar gyfer ystod o ddibenion.
Mae ‘Heartcloth’ yn archwiliad i swyddogaeth a phroses, lle diystyrir diben gwreiddiol tecstilau, ac mae dyfeisgarwch yr artist yn dod i’r amlwg.
Cyn dyfodiad masgynhyrchu, roedd tecstilau’n nwydd gwerthfawr, a byddant yn cael eu defnyddio a’u hailddefnyddio nes eu bod wedi’u dinistrio. Gydag ysbrydoliaeth gan arferion hanesyddol creu cwiltiau clytwaith a boro, caiff tecstilau amrywiol eu hail-uno a’u trawsnewid i greu un cyfan newydd, i gyflawni swyddogaeth newydd. Drwy ddefnyddio tecstilau gwastraff a’u hailddefnyddio mewn gwaith celf newydd, rwy’n hyrwyddo’r ethos ‘gwneud tro a thrwsio’ gan ddefnyddio’r hyn sydd eisoes ganddon ni i greu o’r newydd, ac felly lleihau gwastraff tecstilau a’i effaith niweidiol fyd-eang.
Mae’r safiad moesegol yma wedi datblygu wrth astudio tecstilau yn y brifysgol, lle des i’n ymwybodol o ddulliau cynhyrchu a defnydd hanesyddol o decstilau. Amlygodd yr astudiaethau yma sut mae agweddau wedi newid tuag at decstilau oherwydd y chwyldro diwydiannol, pan ddechreuwyd masgynhyrchu ffabrig, a daeth yn rhatach ac ar gael yn eang. Mae’r symudiad paradeim yma wedi arwain at orgynhyrchu a gwastraff, gan adael dim ond dinistr ar ei ôl. Yn y pen draw, rwy’n gobeithio amlygu’r gwastraff yma ac ysbrydoli eraill i ‘wneud tro a thrwsio’, er mwyn gwneud y defnydd mwyaf o’r adnoddau sydd ganddon ni.
