This half day workshop (1-5pm) on Friday 23 rd May with artists Lynn Setterington & Jill Eastland and Oldham Library and is an afternoon of knowledge exchange around textiles, displacement and mental health as part of Creativity and Wellbeing Week.
It takes place at the Fashion and Textile Museum in the studio where Lynn Setterington’s stitched cloths and quilts are currently on display. The session explores how libraries, smaller museums, and community organisations can engage audiences using creative outreach to improve and aid mental health. Using the 5 Ways to Wellbeing, connect, be active, take notice, keep learning & give, the event is a partnership with Counterpoints Arts and the Fashion and Textile Museum, London.
Please email tom@counterpoints.org.uk to reserve a free place. The event is open to all, regardless of previous experience.
1-1.10pm Welcome
1.10 – 2.10pm Lynn Setterington’s visual talk showcases some of her key projects and partnership work and details how she uses stitch, textile archives and folk art to create artworks with and for refugee communities.
2.10 – 2.40pm – Oldham Libraries staff and volunteers talk about creative community engagement work and the value of Speak English classes
2.40 – 3pm Tea break
3 -3.50pm Collaborative stitch session
3.50 – 4.30pm An interactive, participatory and performative discussion with artist and activist Jill Eastland.
4.30 – 5pm Q + A – suggestions /ideas
5 – 6pm Time to look round the Art of Mankind exhibition
Lynn Setterington is an internationally recognised textile artist. Her work explores contemporary issues and how stitch can be used to commemorate people and communities. Her quilts and cloths are held in many major public museums including the V&A, Crafts Council, IQSC and Whitworth Art Gallery. Born in Yorkshire, she trained at Goldsmith’s College. Her PhD is from UCA Farnham. She a Senior Lecturer at Manchester Metropolitan University.
Jill Eastland is an activist artist and a survivor of mixed heritage. Her work explores themes of social and climate justice. She favours community based and collaborative working practices. She often employs multiples; to create a more detailed discussion of a theme and she tends to produce open-ended bodies of work, as well as finished pieces. Her work is often very detailed and can contain elements of realism and abstraction together. Participants will be invited to wear the uniforms of low-paid and precarious workers, particularly the ubiquitous dark blue tabard. These uniforms mark people out as different and yet at the same time render them invisible. They are often worn by people who are marginalised and discriminated against including Migrants, Refugees, Black People, Women and People who have Disabilities. Together, we will explore the mental health ramifications of the low pay and poor working conditions that people wearing these uniforms encounter daily.
Textiles: The Art of Mankind at the Fashion and Textile Museum celebrates the ancient and deep entanglement between textiles, people and our world. Through the beauty of textiles, you will encounter human ingenuity that can be traced from pre-history to our digital age.
