New Work - Emerging

The New Emerging Works Grant ($9,000) was awarded by the Australia Council as part of a Visual Arts and Craft Strategy Program. 837 applications Australia-wide were considered: 120 artists across the disciplines were funded. Research outcomes were exhibited as a solo exhibition entitled LACED, at the Sheffer Gallery, Sydney 2006, receiving significant reviews. The research met all the intended research goals and criteria and was successfully acquitted by the Australia Council Board. Contemporary lace contributes to new creative future textile solutions. Future lace constructions synthesise the relationship between traditional lace making techniques and emerging new technologies. Technologies researched included developments with nano fabric, new fibers, direct digital printing and laser cutting. A mentorship with lace historian Rosemary Shepherd from the Powerhouse Museum was undertaken in order to learn traditional Bobbin Lace making. The contribution to this new creative area was a fusion of research generated from the analysis of traditional textile techniques with new technologies. The significance of this research is that it has devised new textile applications for a traditional lace-making practice, creating new alternatives and methodologies to generate a new body of textile work. Traditional printmaking techniques have been integrated with digital printing and laser cutting. Traditional Bobbin lace-making has been reinterpreted through machine stitching, to create alternative openwork textile structures. The work stands alone in its field as a new body of contemporary textile work