The Textile Cabin

Alice Kettle is a local textile artist who makes beautiful embroidered art. Gill and I visited Winchester to see Alice Kettle in the process of making an enormous ‘free machine embroidery’ at Winchester Guildhall. When we arrived she was hard at work and the panels of the 16.5 meter long embroidery were stretched out on the floor. Alice has nearly finished this work which has taken almost 2 years to make, ready to be displayed as a permanent embroidery at Winchester’s new Discovery Center in October.

After a tea and jam dougnut (which was delicious) Gill and I returned to the gallery to hear Alice speak. Some of the things she mentioned that I do not want to forget are:

• that when using embroidery you are doing two things; one is drawing; the other is constructing.
• when Alice works she stitches from the back and cannot see what she doing on the front which she finds liberating.
• I was touched by the idea that this piece of work has been created to last for a long long time and that she wanted it to be timeless. It is mysterious to think that people in hundreds of years will be looking at this work. Usually we are looking at work that was created hundreds of years ago and I have never thought of looking at something new the other way around.
• that when working alone you are your own worst enemy and how encouraging it is for people to visit and comment.
• I was also encouraged by her enjoyment of her work; her enthusiasm for colour; and her excitment about new ways of working by using old and new machines and involving other artists.

Alice will be working at Winchester Guildhall until the end of July and speaks about her work most Tuesday mornings. If you are in the area go and have a look, it is definitely worth a visit. The scale of the piece is breath taking and the colours of the threads intermingled with each other are glorious. I am really looking forward to seeing the piece finished and up and have been thoroughly refreshed and inspired by seeing it in patches on the floor.