Soft Activism. Textile art as a healing force

27-31.05.2024

When textile is used in artworks carrying stringent political themes and addressing harsh realities and suffering, the supple and often fragile materials often pose a potent opposition to the frequently tragic origins of the ideas behind the textiles. 
This is the subject of Soft Activism. Textile art as a healing force, curated by Hilde Skancke Pedersen.

Regardless of their background, textile artists all over the world find the use of fabric and all kinds of fibers to be powerful means of expressing their view on values, politics and ways of living, boosting strengthening of identity, pride and cultural ownership.
This exhibition seeks to convey several artists’ reactions to attacks, colonization and recolonization of vulnerable countries, peoples and cultures all over the world, also focusing on themes such as racism, persecution, the exotification and exploitation of peoples and cultures, totalitarianism, war - and solidarity and healing.

Nominated by Hilde Skancke Pedersen:

In her project WOUNDS, the Norwegian artist Mari Meen Halsøy uses tapestry to heal the wounds of war in the Beirut cityscape. WOUNDS is a site-specific and relational project in continuous development since 2010. 
Lebanon's capital, Beirut, has been marked by prolonged war and political unrest. Marks of violence and images of the devastated city´s wounds can be seen everywhere. Tapestries are made for the buildings’ wounds, blending almost invisibly into the cityscape. In contrast to the wreckage, Meen Halsøy engages in the long-term, negative consequences of conflicts that lead to war. Her textiles convey human intimacy and compassion and mend the buildings as if they were bodies.
The tapestries express human endurance and the will to go forward. Powerlessness is replaced by painstaking rebuilding. 


Nominated by Lottozero:

Shaping strong images steeped in references to the post-Soviet period, Belarusian artist Ala Savashevich expresses the insidious but imperative violence of patriarchal and authoritarian societies, especially against women who are forced to adhere to a certain image of femininity to be socially accepted.
Drawing on personal and collective memory, the artist has made an apron out of chain mail, braiding each metal part by hand: a hard and time-consuming job that turns into a performative act referring to principles of serving and obedience in the gender division of labour. The apron-armour becomes a symbol of resistance against the patriarchal norm in social institutions such as the family or school, with a dual and ambiguous valence of protection and instrument of oppression.

Textile art as cultural identity

Many indigenous peoples use textiles as ways of expressing their identity and culture, both in their attire, in traditionally woven textiles etc. The need to express identity and both personal and societal issues develops into artwork inspired or not by the culture the artist was born into. 

Nominated by Bukola Oyebode:

Hussein Shikha's work responds to ornamentation and its marginalized function in Western modernist design, which observes principles such as 'less is more' and 'form follows function'. In particular, the monumental tapestry Garden of Eden transforms his digital art and animation designs and brings alive ancient iconographies and the disappearing southern Iraqi carpet weaving heritage. During his own displacement and immigration journey from Iraq to Belgium, carpets were present in places where he sought refuge, such as relatives' homes in Iraq and rented apartments in Syria. Since then, they became an ingrained representation of his Arab identity, creating a sense of association with another place different from his diaspora abode. 

Nominated by Zoe Yeh:

Labay Eyong blends weaving with metalworking to craft composite artworks exploring ethnic migration, women's rights, and self-identity. Dunkgu Asang is an outdoor textile installation project that takes place entirely in the Hongye Tribe. On one hand, it revitalizes tribal cultural development, while on the other, it immerses viewers into the mountains, allowing outsiders to understand the tribe's history and dilemma. Using textiles as a medium, the project delves into the relationship between mining activities and indigenous tribes. The artwork is exhibited in the mining area on the mountains of Hongye Village in Wanrong Township, collaborating with 15 weavers to hand weave Gabang (blankets), inscribing contemporary responses from female weavers to the times.

SOFT Materials

The soft materials can sometimes carry the intended meaning of the artwork through in more poignant ways than if harder materials were used, juxtaposing theme and expression.

Nominated by TextielMuseum:

In this Coat of Many Colors, textiles bring together fifteen Tilburg women with diverse cultural backgrounds. Under the guidance of artist Theodorus Johannes, participants in the Bindweefsel’project met weekly to exchange knowledge with each other and experts from the TextielLab. While helping each other learn textile techniques like passimenterie and embroidery, they created a collective artwork. 
In the Bindweefsel project, textiles created a bridge across language barriers, cultural differences and personal insecurities. While sharing their stories, creativity and laughter with one another, each woman created a small piece of the coat. The act of making something together and forming a family became as important as the final product.

Nominated by CHAT (Centre for Heritage, Arts and Textile):

Jakkai Siributr’s IDP Story Cloth portrays the plight of ethnic minority groups in Myanmar who end up as migrant workers in Thailand and are often exploited by their Thai employers. The artist asked his studio assistants to embroider the four pieces as a way for the Thai assistants to learn about the issues in Myanmar and have empathy for their fellow colleague from the Mon minority. Traditional Mon story cloths are known for their colourful embroidery that resembles children’s drawings, which was used like language among the Mon people. At first glance, IDP Story Cloth presents a bustling yet peaceful view of a Mon village, but at a closer look it reveals the cruel reality facing the Mon migrants.

Nominated by Caroline Kipp:

Krystle Lemonias’ woodblock printed textiles examine Black immigrant women’s domestic labor and employment, emphasizing them as integral to society. Her personal and familial experiences with caregiving work deeply influence her practice and conceptual concerns. In detailed assemblages like “My man can eat eeh; go put dis in the gahbage,” the artist highlights tender moments between caregivers and their charges. Yet her patchwork surfaces, composed of second-hand children’s clothes and fabric diapers from families who hired her mother or herself to care for their children, reveal the nuanced power negotiation between class, gender, and racism in domestic employment.

Nominated by Central Museum of Textiles:

The textile has always accompanied all kinds of protests. Banners and flags are important tools for "shouting" ideas, encouraging people to fight for what they believe in. In 2018, a group of independent artists founded the 100 Flag Collective. They wanted to recall and commemorate the hundredth anniversary of Polish Women's Suffrage but also to force us to reflect on the situation of women in Poland at the beginning of the 21st century. A manifesto was written, and an invitation to participate in the project was addressed to everyone who cares about women's rights, regardless of gender, views, social status, place of origin or residence.  

THE CURATOR

Born in 1953 in Hammerfest, Hilde Skancke Pedersen has been based in Guovdageaidnu in Finnmark for 25 years, on the Norwegian side of Sápmi. As a young artist in the 1970s, she studied at the University college of Art Crafts in Oslo, and later she also graduated from the Creative Writing program at the University of Tromsø in Northern Norway. In the 1990s and early 2000s her career as a visual artist and curator picked up pace. She has curated exhibitions for the Sami Art Museum/Riddo Duottar Museat and the Sami Centre for Contemporary Art. She has carried out many public commissions,and worked with design for theatre productions.