A creative response to Making It: building your craft future at the Whitworth

My name is Tasmin Williams and I’m currently in my final year of a Three Dimensional Design Degree at Manchester School of Art. I specialise in ceramics, exploring clays tactile qualities through hand built forms created to be held and touched.

Last week I attended the North West Craft Network event, ‘Making it: Building your craft future’ at The Whitworth Art Gallery. I was given the opportunity to respond to the day’s events through the medium of clay.

The talks and 1:1 surgeries delivered by established crafts people covered so much insightful information and facilitated the opportunity to network with these experienced practitioners along with like-minded individuals who all have a passion for crafts. The artist talk that really inspired me was that given by Halima Cassell. It was fascinating to see how her work has progressed from when she was a University graduate and continues to develop throughout her career as a practicing artist.

Being in a room with all of these incredibly creative people was a great opportunity for me to further explore the relationship between the clay material and human touch.

I decided to document the day through a series of objects made by the participants taking part in the day’s activities. Giving each person a ball of clay, I asked them to play with the clay and create anything they wanted to. The series of objects made were fantastic.

There was such a wide variety of shapes and textures and almost every participant that had a go enjoyed the experience with one lady describing it as therapeutic. Most people were tentative in the way they picked up the clay at first but once they had rolled it around in their hands for a while they became more comfortable and familiar with its malleable properties. I feel the area in which each person practices affected the way they interacted with the clay. For example, a lady who purely works in two dimensions spent most of her time adding patterns to her object using the fine metal tools.

I found the event incredibly helpful and it has provided struggling and up and coming craft practitioners with tools they can use to move their practice onto its next stages and I am very privileged to have been part of such a fantastic opportunity.

Check out Tasmin's Blog

Tactile Too - fantastic opportunity for recent textile students and graduates

Calling all North West students and recent graduates!

The Whitworth Art Gallery is looking to commission up to four contemporary textile makers to develop a textile handling resource as part of The Whitworth's 'Tactile Too' Textile handling Resource.

Applicants must be practising textile makers based in the North West of England. This includes students currently studying in the North West and students who have graduated from other colleges but who are now based in the North West.

Candidates must either be in their final year of their degree or have graduated no more than three years ago.

All applicants must respond to the theme:  Textiles Transform: Extra/Ordinary

The theme has been developed to explore the concept of the sensory nature of textiles, that they have the power to evoke personal emotional responses based on memory and subconscious perceptions. It is important to ensure that these ideas are clearly explained and demonstrated in the proposal submission and the tactile handling resource.

The deadline for submissions is Monday 15 September 2014

For more information about the commission and how to submit click here

For more information about Tactile Too and the artists whose work makes up the resource, click here

Three events to strengthen North West Craft

Louise Gardiner, You Blow Me Away DETAIL for COLLECT 2013

Three fantastic events are coming up that will help to boost contemporary craft in the North West: A symposium, plus two events for emerging makers and curators: 

In October 2014, The North West Craft Network will invite key players in national and regional craft to come to together for a symposium to explore; 'Building the market for collectors in the North West' at the Great Northern Contemporary Craft Fair in partnership with Great Northern Events.

And that's not all. In February 2015, an event for emerging makers will be hosted by the newly re-furbished Whitworth Art Gallery and in May 2015 the Network will organise an event for curators in conjunction with COLLECT at the Saatchi Gallery.

For more details about these events as they emerge, get in touch at craftnorthwest@gmail.com and we will send you the information when it is ready.

For more about the North West Craft Network, click here.


Image: Based in the North West, maker Louise Gardiner created the 'You Blow Me Away' series of Embroidered and appliqued tumbleweed for COLLECT 2012 at the Saatchi Gallery. Check out her website here, or follow her on Twitter @Loulougardiner
Louise is an opening speaker for the NW Craft Network's symposium 'Building the Market for Collectors of Contemporary Craft in the North West' at the Great Northern Contemporary Craft Fair, above.