Unique Perspectives

Opening today at the BUNBURY REGIONAL ART GALLERIES , UNIQUE PERSPECTIVES: TWO SOLO EXHIBITIONS – Felted work by Helen O’Hare (Ireland), and Joomchi Paper Works by Jiyoung Chung (USA/Korea).

Brilliant, expressive, inspiring work representing the diversity of textile and fibre art across the world. This exhibition is brought to us by Bunbury Regional Art Galleries in partnership with Fibres West 2011.

Convergence attendees will be enjoying a trip to view it as we have organised a break from felting to visit.

Helen O'Hare Gallery Shot

Helen O'Hare Detail

Jiyoung Chung Information Courtesy TAFTA

UNIQUE PERSPECTIVES opens today and runs from 23 September – 13 November 2011. 

Unique Perspectives Part III

The second textile artist on show at this exiting exhibition is Jiyoung Chung (USA/Korea) with her work titled Joomchi Paper Works.

Jiyoung Chung is a tutor at TAFTA's 2011 Geelong Forum and Janet de Boer of TAFTA has very kindly allowed us to reproduce this article from Textile Fibre Forum Issue 2, No 102, 2011 -

For more pictures of Jiyoung Chung's work click here.

UNIQUE PERSPECTIVES: TWO SOLO EXHIBITIONS – Felted work by Helen O’Hare (Ireland), and Joomchi Paper Works by Jiyoung Chung (USA/Korea) is presented by BUNBURY REGIONAL ART GALLERIES 23 September – 13 November2011, in partnership with Fibres West 2011.

Unique Perspectives Part II

If your head is still spinning from the size of Helen O'Hare's work in yesterdays post we have some more pictures for you but first - let's meet Helen-

Helen's Workshop

Clearly Helen needs a big space to work in when you consider the size of some of her exhibition pieces.  She's based in Northern Ireland and you can read more about her work by clicking here.

We have some more pictures of her work; these kindly sent to us by Janet de Boer of TAFTA (Australian Forum For Textiles Arts Ltd) -

Section of large piece.

Grey pink detail

Detail colour

1999 Felt work.

Helen's beautiful installation work will be on view at BUNBURY REGIONAL ART GALLERIES 23 September – 13 November 2011.  

Don't miss it!

Unique Perspectives Part I

Convergence participants may like to take a break from all the felting and have a trip out.

Bunbury Regional Art Galleries Photo By strasser©paul - Panoramio

We have therefore organised a trip to  BUNBURY REGIONAL ART GALLERIES , for you to enjoy  UNIQUE PERSPECTIVES: TWO SOLO EXHIBITIONS – Felted work by Helen O’Hare (Ireland), and Joomchi Paper Works by Jiyoung Chung (USA/Korea). Brilliant, expressive, inspiring work representing the diversity of textile and fibre art across the world.  This exhibition is brought to us by Bunbury Regional Art Galleries in partnership with Fibres West 2011, and runs from 23 September – 13 November 2011.

First lets look at Helen O'Hare who is a talented artist doing some amazing felt work as you can see from these photos which she very kindly sent us -

Gallery Shot

Detail

Detail

Detail

Gallery Shot

Gallery Shot

Look in tomorrow to see more of Helen's work.

Happy Valentine's Day

Felt Hearts by The Bunbury Felters

Happy Christmas

To celebrate Christmas Day with felters across the world we thought we would share these beautiful icons with you.

Mystic by S Seaman

Byzantine by S Seaman

Celtic by S Seaman

We on the 11th Southern Hemisphere Felting Convergence Committee wish you all a very happy Christmas.

The International Day of Felt

Yes felt has its very own day and it's today the 2nd October. 

Check out our friends at Felt United to find out more.  Their goal is to connect feltmakers around the globe to raise awareness of felt as both a craft and an artform and celebrate the world's oldest known textile. 

Well we are happy to participate by displaying some pictures of our felt in this years collours of yellow, green and blue.

First a felt vessel -

Artist S Seaman

Detail from a scarf -

Designer C Castledine

And looking down on the crown of a hat -

Designer J Gibson

Happy International day of Felt.

Fragments of Fantasy

Exhibition open from today.

Creatures from the Deep

Continuing our look at things that live in the waters that surround Bunbury and appear in our felt creations; one of our favourites is the beautiful elegant sting rays that can sometimes be seen sunning themselves on hot afternoons in shallow water.

By Jean Braund

These felt fish were created by Davida Palmer from a Judit Poc workshop.

By D Palmer

D Palmer

This shoal of fish was made by Sue Seaman.  Each fish is about 80 cm long.  The felt was hand dyed to get the right colour  and then machine embroidered to give the effect of scales.  The fins and tails were made from organdy; again machine stitching was added.  Each fish had a metal wire inserted into the body and held by a block of wood.

"Will This Be All The Future Holds, Memories and Shoals of Fabric Fish"
by S Seaman

The finished piece was entered into the 1998 South West Survey.

Something Fishy Going On

Bunbury is a regional  port city of Western Australia situated 175 kilometres south of Perth.  It is protected from the Indian Ocean by the Leschenault Inlet, which opens to Koombana Bay a popular swimming and sailing spot.

Image Tourism Western Australia

Not surprisingly our watery surroundings often provide the inspiration for some of our felt creations.

Take this small sample for example, created many years ago by Gloria Truman -

More recently Lorraine McArthur made this sampler at a FeltWest workshop run by Catherine O'Leary

Good felt requires the fibres to meld right the way through the fabric and Lorraine passes this test with flying  fish colours!

Lorraine can do big fish as well as she shows with this chair -

Now for more underwater creatures - this jelly fish created by Val Hornibrook-

Look at the detail -

If you want to be inspired by water then there are plenty of things to do around the coast of Bunbury.  One of the most amazing local attractions are the dolphins of Koombana Bay.  Such a big dolphin population has resulted in the creation of our Dolphin Discovery Centre - Australia's first dedicated research centre.

Image Tourism Western Australia

Here you can organise to swim with the dolphins.  An amazing experience and definitely one to do when you finish felting at the 11th Southern Hemisphere Felting Convergence in October 2011.

Image Tourism Western Australia

Looking forward to seeing all your watery work there.

Felt for Arts Sake

There are often debates on what is art and what is craft and lets face it, many find the whole concept of textile art confusing.  We think felt vessels fall firmly in the art category and we are pleased to be showing these in our gallery today -

Artist J Williams

Artist V Hornibrook

Artist H O'Neill

What's your view?