Inspirations Inspirations issue 97

On the cover of each issue we like to add a few evocative words, a subtitle of sorts, that captures the feel of the magazine and gives you a little hint of what you will find inside. At times this is a very easy task as many of the projects in an issue follow a theme or share subject matter–issue 93 contained six projects featuring birds so the subtitle, Birds of a Feather, virtually wrote itself. Issue 96 featured Christmas projects so Festive Fun was another obvious choice. Other times it’s not so easy as the projects and subject matter can be diverse and it can be a real challenge to think of something equally appealing and appropriate. In this issue, New Horizons seemed a perfect moniker for this collection of…

Living a healthy life, attending powwows, reconnecting with their Native language and educating children reflect the couple’s holistic approach to the revitalization of their Native American culture, which has suffered decades of federal assimilation policies. In the 1880s, off-reservation Boarding Schools were established to assimilate Native People into the mainstream of American culture. Children were taken away from their reservations and sent off to Indian Boarding Schools run like military institutions, where they would learn English, be strictly forbidden to speak their Native language and be raised as whites. Under the Assimilation through Education program many generations of Native American children were brutally separated from their families and made to forget their language. In 1883, The Court of Indian Offenses outlawed Native American traditional ceremonies, claiming these rituals encouraged warlike passions…

Growing up in a family who loved arts, books, music, poetry, and movies, and where there was plenty of freedom to roam, Sandra Sawatzky really had no option but to pursue a creative life. Enthralled by beautiful fabrics, she taught herself to sew at thirteen. After studying visual communications at Alberta College of Art and Design in Calgary, she changed course and attended film school at the South Alberta Institute of Technology where she graduated with honours. Sandra taught the history of textiles, clothing and apparel design and co-hosted a weekly campus radio show about movies before becoming a full-time film maker. In 2007 Sandra and her daughter visited the Glenbow Museum in Calgary to see an exhibition of hand embroidery and lace made by pioneering women in Alberta. “Most of…

QUEENSLAND The original artworks from Jeannie Baker’s latest book, CIRCLE, will be the subject of an exhibition at the Mt Coot-tha Botanic Gardens, Brisbane from December 11– February 25, 2018 and at the Bundaberg Art Gallery from March 7–May 6, 2018. Illustrated with beautifully detailed and textured collages, the book follows the 11,000 km migration of the Bar-tailed Godwit from Australia through Southeast Asia to its breeding grounds in Alaska and back to Australia. Further information is available from www.brisbane.qld.gov.au/facilities.../brisbane-botanic-gardens-mount-coot-tha SOUTH AUSTRALIA The museum of the Embroiderers’ Guild of South Australia Inc., features embroidered textiles from countries around the world. The current exhibition is BARBARA ROWNEY: A PASSION FOR TEXTILES, showcasing exquisite donated objects ranging from small textile fragments to complete costumes. Museum Open Days are: Tuesdays, 10am–2pm. Embroiderers’ Guild of SA premises:…

The Art of Felting & Silk Ribbon Embroidery Di van Niekirk with Toody Cassidy | Metz Press 2017 | Soft Cover 160 pg | ISBN 978-1-928376-00-2 | RRP AU$49.99 This book is a little like a beautiful love story. Of course, there is a lovely couple – he’s a bit woolly and can be very hard work but she is as refined and delicate as can be and always brings smiles and splashes of colour wherever she goes. Perhaps they don’t seem like an ideal match but there does seem to be some truth in the idea that ‘opposites attract’ and you can soon see that they are just made for one another! In this, her thirteenth book, Di explores the wonderful marriage of silk ribbon embroidery and felted backgrounds and the results…

Motivated by the Quaker Tapestry in Kendal, England, a group of women came together in Sydney to tell the story of the Quaker history in Australia. In 2007 Bridget Guest from the Tapestry Centre in the UK came to Australia for a series of workshops in the design and execution of the panels. She also taught the local women to do the Quaker stitch – a stitch specifically designed for this project by Anne Wynn-Wilson, founder of the Quaker Tapestry. Both the Quaker Tapestry in the UK and the local panels’ design is based on the layout of the famous Bayeux Tapestry. Each panel is divided horizontally into three zones. A wide middle zone where the main story is depicted and a narrow decorative border at the top and bottom. In…