Katharine Swailes
Katharine Swailes
“As a tapestry weaver I am part of a tradition that reaches back thousands of years and the way of working is on the whole unchanged, I use the same materials wool cotton and linen, a conscious choice, the materials are suited to being worked by hand. The act of weaving defies time, and thoughts go to the ancient worlds, and the weavers who sat as I do. When the idea of time was different, with the constants the sun and the moon. But we live in a constructed world that defies the seasons, day and night, we work hard in our communities that now reach out across the globe connected by an invisible web.
“As I weave I am time travelling, the process of weft through warp over the span of a hand unchanged for millennia. My thoughts are of humanity and our place in this world.
“In deconstructing my weaving process and reconstructing it, exploring the motion and focus of passing weft through warp, it is finding an expressive path a a painter does. I create no formal tapestry techniques just the pattern of the hand weaving: the weaving is a meditative act both literally and conceptually. A carefully constructed system of preparation, creates a space for the weaving process where. The outcome is not planned and it takes courage to weave in this way slowly building upward from the warp bar, once woven the decisions can’t be changed. The finished work reveals the activity of the mind the constant search to flow one piece of weft seamlessly into the next.
“I am industrious in my activity like the weavers of the past, revealed in the fragments of tapestry they leave behind. Connecting humanity through the centuries.”
Katharine Swailes, June 2022
Katharine Swailes at her loom