4.06.2017

Windoo display for In-Use Clothing.



I'm mad about the found and the disposable
I'm in love with craftsmanship.
I admire nature.
Reinvention is my daily challenge.
I love dreaming while I travel and tramp.
I search to find a unique personality for each of my projects.
I like making a mess.

Wood Mobile: Designed for use indoors and protected uncover outdoor areas.
Materials: Wooden coffee stirrers, hand crafted, cut and sanded.







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8.25.2014

IN-USE Finely Crafted Denim Jeans, and a good wood windoo too.

Latest windoo design for IN-USE. Created using Papier-mâché recycled paper, and card.




3.02.2014

Weaving #3

This weeks weaving comes inspired by Whakaari conservation area (Mt Judah track), the stunning hand dyed, and woven wool from Ashburton Canterbury, Peter Vendelbosch's (Nelson Potter), lichen, and the Gansey Jumper.


2.27.2014

The art of topiary

My latest weaving inspired by the art of topiary.


1.22.2014

Cruel City Art/News New Zealand

I have just received 20 copies of the Cruel City Catalogue from The Suter Art Gallery, if anyone would like a copy? featuring Josephine Cachemaille, Dan Campion, Lisa Chandler, and myself.  Just message me on Facebook http://
on.fb.me/KACdUg
Art News New Zealand this summer features the work of Josephine Cachemaille. Its well worth a read and if you look really hard you can see my work in the background. It also has the wonderful Francis Upritchard on the front cover who is currently exhibiting in Freedom Farmers at Auckland Art Gallery till March 2nd.













12.05.2013

IN USE

IN USE
Finely crafted Denim Jeans and good good clothing.

If you you find yourself in need of a new pair of Jeans, I recommend visiting Nina in her wonderful studio in Paekakariki.












































Paekakariki also has a very lovely Deli which serves great Coffee and some yummy foods. And if you want to see the cutest fruit and veg shop pop next door.









9.24.2013

FEMKE AGEMA

Here's my next instalment of favourite textile/fashion artist.

Femke Agema, creates amazing wearable forms which I cant get enough of. I love the originality, craftsmanship, and fantastical ideas behind her work, all done with such wonderful humour and playfulness.

Elders
Is a vision of the world springing into life after winter. It’s inspired by the simple joy we feel in being let loose into the wild to play in an environment overflowing with possibilities. A world where you make treehouses, huts and rafts from whatever you can get your hands on. A world made to be explored, bursting with colours and textures, where the only limit is your imagination. 

Femke Agema 'Elders' Parade from BASTER on Vimeo.

Nigliktok 2012
Created for the inevitable snowpocalypse, the Nigliktok collection, takes its name from the Inuit word for 'cold.' Nigliktok is Femke's vision of a world frozen over, a world where ice and snow dominate, but her signature colourful and playful aesthetic can still illuminate the landscape











































Femke can also be found on Facebook 

Continuing on with magnificent creature creation, I thought I should include a picture of Artist Nick Caves soundsuit. Nina van der Voorn's Kingdom of Klah, and The Klah Gazette for her equally wonderful imagination. And to conclude Charles Freger, check out the article written in the Guardian Savage, beautiful and surviving.


Nick Cave

Nina van der Voorn






































wild man; Wilder Mann by Charles Freger

9.09.2013

Magdalena Abakanowicz




Over the next few weeks I'm going to be looking at some of my favourite textile artists c.1960s to the present day and who best to start with but Magdalena. The sheer size of these works are outstanding, the Bois-le-Duc, measuring 65-feet-long, 26-feet-tall. (pictured top right).

'Abakanowicz’s work came to international attention through the emotional intensity of its engagement with fibre and textiles. Her ‘Abakans’—a generic title for a series of interrelated works described by the artist as ‘textile situations’—are woven structures in which shaped tapestry elements are assembled to form enveloping installations'. 

Magdalena has a website here
Magdalena Abakanowicz podcast
National Gallery of Australia 









































8.06.2013

Cruel City 400,000 holes





Images by Kirsty Keen

7.26.2013

400,000 holes A hand punched work.

Claire Ellery
400,000 holes
Hand punched sheet foam

With a history of lace in mind and reflecting upon the medium of textiles, this work explores the historical significance of handmade lace alongside the mass production of luxury commodity in contemporary society. While not making lace in the traditional sense, this textile work attains the significance of handmade lace through an obsessive investment of time and action. In doing so, I have shifted 'value' from the luxury commodity to its wrapping material and upheld the importance of human manufacture.






7.17.2013

Nelson Mail article on Cruel City Exhibition



Bared for the gaze of the city
http://www.stuff.co.nz/nelson-mail/features/arts/8901100/Bared-for-the-gaze-of-the-city

Is Nelson a "cruel city", a conservative city struggling with art that challenges and pushes boundaries? Judith Ritchie checks it out.
Colin McCahon wrote to the Suter Art Gallery in 1978, saying "Nelson is a cruel city - to people and paintings", referring to small-town responses to and acceptance of contemporary art. Using this as a hypothesis, the Suter has a new exhibition titled Cruel City, featuring four Nelson artists' work, ranging from installation, textile work, to large-format painting and mixed media.
Josephine Cachemaille, Lisa Chandler, Dan Campion and Claire Ellery are in effect baring their art for the city of Nelson to respond. Will it be a cruel city or kind?
The show is curated by Anna-Marie White, who says the Suter is honoured to have the work of four artists who have all pursued their careers vigorously, and who challenge the notions of conformity, with works that question and confront, humour and subverse.
"We work really hard at the Suter to support artists; these four are all on the same level, they've done post-graduate study, have had residencies, including at the Refinery Art Space, and other new gallery spaces in Nelson like G-Space, plus made national art networks."
She adds that there is a new direction in contemporary art in Nelson, with changing conditions because of the global economic crisis, creating testing times for artists. "Serious artists have made it through; by networking with galleries, they have created a fabric which supports experimental non-commercial art in Nelson."
Cachemaille says her work in this show is about the law of attraction. She has made an installation "hex", each piece representing key figures in the arts world, designed to "enhance my success in the art world and escape from the provinces", as she puts it. She says that Nelson in some ways can be kind and in other ways closed and limited. "I'm resorting to magic to get what I want."
Ellery has spent the last five weeks working fulltime seven days a week on her five hangings in the exhibition.
"I've made work that is representative of myself. I often use disposable materials from waste and transform them." Here she has taken polythene foam from around computers and hand-punched small holes, using a lace pattern as template, 80,000 on each panel. "It's repetitive and requires perserverance, like the original hand-made lace would have been."



Chandler, currently away on a residency in Singapore, has four massive paintings taking up the far wall of the gallery space, measuring 7.8 metres long by 2.5 metres high. White comments that these ambitious works show Chandler "has really hit her stride as an artist".
Chandler has been continuing a theme of non-places in global cities, with previous works produced after spending time in Kuala Lumpur Airport, and now the current works based on the Underground in London.
"They are generic, people passing through a de-humanised environment; it's not a sociable place.
"She also makes historical references to the plague, a burial pit, contrasting that with zombies, people zoned-out."
Campion says his installations are a byproduct of travelling. "Something I've crafted, found or a byproduct."
He says his work in the gallery has come about by selection which sits alongside the large paintings by Chandler. His wall-mounted large-scale syringe in cream and a touch of yellow, compliments Chandler's palette, while making an uneasy reference to her zombies and the Underground underworld.
If Colin McCahon struggled with how his work was received decades ago, will these four contemporary artists feel the wrath of a cruel city today?
  • Cruel City, The Suter Art Gallery, Bridge St, Nelson, to August 18.

6.09.2013

Cloud in a box

Clouds in a box are magical...
Catch a cloud, attach a string, write a note, hide a present/s inside.

6.02.2013

The Suter Art Gallery - Cruel City





Cruel City 6 July – 18 August
In a letter to Suter Gallery staff in 1978, the great New Zealand modern painter, Colin McCahon stated that: “Nelson is a cruel city – to people and to paintings.” By turning this statement into an hypothesis, Cruel City asks whether Nelson is any kinder to innovative artists, especially those working in conceptual and abstract styles.
Cruel City will feature major new work by artists based in Nelson: Josephine Cachemaille, Dan Campion, Lisa Chandler and Claire Ellery.
Opening Friday 12 July 5.30 pm
Artists talk Saturday 3 August 2 pm
All artists will be present

6.01.2013

A work in progress

 I'm  on my 3rd attempt at getting this right. Heres a sneak peak at my latest work...




3.23.2013

Pleats Please. Taylors 'We love shoes'

I have been pleating lately and created my own pleating board using Nicole Beaufrog wonderful instructions. Heres the results...  windows for Taylors 'We love shoes' Nelson and Richmond stores













2.12.2013

1.03.2013

geometric window display




Windoo display by Claire Ellery for Taylors shoes Richmond NZ