We were off to Hull last time I posted and I think I shall draw a veil over the journey up. Torrential rain, roadworks, missed lunch at the National Trust and had the worst pizza known to man at a motorway services. I thought they couldn't mess up Pizza. I was wrong.
However the next morning I opened the curtains at the Travelodge (cheapish hotel chain) and discovered that this hotel, on a very busy road, was completely fields and trees at the back. In a tree just feet from the window were a squirrel and a green woodpecker and rabbits were playing on the grass below. Like waking up in pet's corner. Wonderful.
We were due for our talk, near Hull on the afternoon so we went into Beverly - a lovely little town. In the Minster there were a set of panels on the life of Saint John of Beverly, all completed in the sixties by students from the Hull Regional College of art. One of the panels by Jennifer Gray is shown below. I seem to remember that she was the tutor for this college - quite a well known and much respected figure. Does anybody know more about her.
Very evocative of embroidery of that time they were worked on dyed fabrics with applique and laid fillings. Lovely stitching - see detail below.
Also in the Monster were a series of modern panels - mostly commercial screen printing but some had embroidery, like this delightful small panel showing the ship building industry.
You can see from the detail how lovely the work is. No-one could tell me anything about it or who made it. it does annoy me when good work goes uncredited.
The talk on 'Putting on the Glitz' for the East Yorkshire Embroidery Society went really well. A big audience, probably around 100, and they are a lively bunch. As they are EYES they have a junior group called eyelets. Cute, eh? Much needed, too.
A good trip home in sunshine and we are shattered today.
3 comments:
Hi Maggie, welcome back. Mentioning Jennifer Gray in your post, had me reaching for my "Machine Embroidery" book (1963), you were quite right about Kingston-on-Hull. In her acknowledgements she credits students of Hull and Bradford Regional Colleges of Art and Crafts for examples of their work. I know it is a book I used to refer to when I first started teaching. Now superceded by yours and VC_H's, well-respected tomes. Thanks for the photos of work you had the opportunity to see.
May be time for you to publish a new book (BG)....... where to see what in Embroidery in Britain! National Trust and English heritage would be certainly interested, as well as the tourist board..
On that note.........making a swift exit :0)
Best Wishes
Maggie
Thanks to Maggie (H), I just found your blog and lo and behold, you'rve been in my home city! (Hull) So rarely is it mentioned in the same sentence as "culture!"
Looking forward to keeping tabs on what you're up to, when you're not WOWing. Amazed at how much you pack into each day!
Hi!
I've been reading your blog since you started...okay, that's not a terribly long time but it is obvious that you are hooked. It is also quite apparent that I will continue to read as long as you are willing to write.
Thank you so much for sharing your trips, speaking engagements, and especially for working so hard on the upcoming retrospective on Valerie Campbell Harding. I look forward to seeing it. I don't have my airline reservations yet...but I'm working on them.
It is so lovely that London's Stitching and Knitting Show (or is it the other way around...Knitting and Stitching?) falls on the same weekend as is Birmingham Royal Ballet's scheduled performance at the Sadler Wells Theater. I'll see my son dance and fill the rest of the time with fibers. Hopefully, I will also have the opportunity to bring hhim to this show too.
I brought him to last year's show at the NEC. He had just moved to Birmingham...no pots and pans, no sheets or blankets, no trash containers or soap or telephone or eating utensils...just an eighteen year old in a furnished apartment abroad. I had come to "help" and attend the show at the NEC. My son was much taken by you and your fabulous demonstration...he made me buy water soluble paper and all! Anyway, thank you for working so hard to mount this upcoming retrospective.
Ms. Campbell-Harding came once to America...to Louisville, Kentucky...to the School of Advanced Study for EGA USA (which I don't think still exists). I was in the class. I had only used my brand new 1630 Bernina about four times before this class...so I consider this my "formal education" in free motion embroidery...I learned from "the best". I look forward to revisiting her work, her influences, and now (thanks to your blog) I understand why I seem to mount everything on black fabric.
I would also like to add my support to the recent comment made by the "other Maggie"...please do publish a book on where to see embroidery in Great Britain...my, of my, would that make trips easy...a ready made itinerary! Sounds fantastic...I'll be the first in line to purchase that tome...almost like midnight is going to be this weekend...waiting for J.K. Rowlings' new volume!
Thanks again!
Susan
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