(The winner is revealed in this post)The Wangaratta Contemporary Textile Award exhibition is coming up, opening on June 4. Two of my works have been accepted for the show. I was also in the inaugural award exhibition two years ago (see this post). This first work is called Fence. It's woven with a galvanised steel wire warp, and a paper weft. The wire was then allowed to rust, staining the paper. The title came because the coils of woven wire reminded me of fences waiting to be rolled out across the landscape. 
(Original images here.) 
Until recent rains and flooding, the dominant discourse about the countryside was the drought that had been causing hardship to farmers across the country. The rusted paper in Fence made me think of abandoned farms, rusted fences, and the brown, dusty soil of drought-affected farms.
(Image by Jason Edwards, available here.)
The other work accepted into the show is called Fences. It is a series of three works similar to Fence, but the paper used for the weft is hand made and includes human hair, plant material, pigments, and spices. The works were all made earlier this year. They are all about 15cm wide, with varying lengths. All are displayed coiled, but there is no set configuration for them.
Forgot to mention that all photos are by Adrian Cook.
This post has images I took at Hazelhurst Regional Gallery & Arts Centre of the Hands On: Craft in Contemporary Art show that I'm exhibiting in. They're just snapshots I took in the gallery, without tripod or lighting changes, so not great quality. They at least give an overview of the show. It's a great space, and the work has been well placed by curator Cash Brown. The show has a great variety of textile techniques and materials, and it all works really well together. The information about works is from the catalogue, so I may not have all the correct details. I also don't have images of all the artists' work.
The work in the shot above is Say it with flowers by Linelle Stepto. What looks like a dried flower arrangement is made from cane toad skin and kangaroo fur. Below are 8 pieces from my The Devil's Cloth series:
Here's something I wrote about this series:"The medieval eye found any surface in which a background could not be distinguished from a foreground disturbing. Thus, striped clothing was relegated to those on the margins or outside the social order -- jugglers and prostitutes, for example -- and in medieval paintings the devil himself is often depicted wearing stripes."
Publisher's blurb from The Devil's Cloth: A History of Stripes and Striped Fabric by Michel Pastoureau
I was intrigued by this book's investigation of striped fabrics from medieval times to the present. Pastoureau also writes about the striped uniforms that concentration camp inmates were forced to wear in the mid-twentieth century. The Holocaust has been a recurring theme in my work, and the use of human hair is a link to that event. The patterns I have used in this series are mainly taken from Japanese fabrics, so the meanings that may have applied in 13th century Europe obviously do not apply. I hope, however, that viewers can draw out and connect these many meanings when they think about the material, the pattern and the technique combining in this series of woven works.In this photo, Newell Harry's Untitled is on the left, Braveheart, take 4 by Dani Marti in the middle, and Phone book fashion by Betty Bird in the foreground:
Silke Raetze's Mayflower series is on the left, Peace in the Universe by Jedda-Daisy Culley, not sure of the next work, but in the case in the foreground is, I think, Rockers in my back yard by Cecilia Fogelberg:
Another view of Cecilia Fogelberg's work, with, I think, Leah Emery's The Exhibition on the wall:
A series of applique and embroidery works on linen by Adrienne Doig is on the back wall, with Alan Jones' Todd on the right, and woven polyester mono filament sculptures by Minka Gillian in the foreground: 
On the wall behind Alan Jones' work are some works by Narelle Jubelin and Barbara Campbell I think collectively called Refer to Source. On the facing wall is embroidery by Timothy Moore:
Catherine Hearse's figures are on the plinth on the left, Michelle Hamer's Only a little bit dead on the wall, the large sculpture is Auropod by Alice Lang, and Adrienne Kneebone's Town'n'Kantri is on the plinth in the background:
Bridie Connell's Hanky Panky Fiction is on the left, Symbiosis #17 by Annie Aitken is next, my work is in the background. Helen Pynor's sculptural hair work Untitled (heart lungs) is in a perspex box on the wall on the right. It's the exhibition invitation image:
Some works by Anton Veenstra on the left, the back view of Todd, Narelle Jubelin and Barbara Campbell's work again, and, I think, Ingrid Wimbury's Liminal Rituals #2: 
Hands On: Craft in Contemporary Art, an exhibition curated by Cash Brown, opens this Friday at Hazelhurst Regional Gallery in Gymea. It runs from December 4 - January 30, 2011. I'm exhibiting some pieces from my The Devil's Cloth series, the first time I've exhibited any of them (I mentioned them in an earlier post here). It includes artists:Annie Aitken, Betty Bird, Nicolette Benjamin Black, Patricia Casey, Bridie Connell, Jedda-Daisy Culley, Adrienne Doig, Leah Emery, Kirsten Fredericks, Cecilia Fogelberg, Minka Gillian, Michelle Hamer, Newell Harry, Catherine Hearse, Alan Jones, Narelle Jubelin & Barbara Campbell, Adrienne Kneebone, Alice Lang, Rodney Love, Dani Marti, Timothy Moore, Sarah Nolan, Jessica Emily Price, Helen Pynor, Silke Raetze, Linelle Stepto, Anton Veenstra, and Ingrid Wimbury.
The final leg of the Momentum: 18th Tamworth Fibre Textile Biennial 2008 tour opens at Adelaide's Jam Factory tomorrow night. 
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