NEWS
Flax Turns: Open Studio with Christine Borland
Fri 25 Feb 2022, 11am-12.45pm, 22.5 The Square
Join Flax Turns project artists in their studio to learn more about flax, linen, distaffs and more!
Fancy a peek into the new artists' studio at Square Deal?
Join Flax Turns artists Christine Borland, Lynne Hocking-Mennie and Daisy Williamson along with their tutor Cath Snape in their studio for a cuppa and a biscuit to learn more about the project and all things Flax spinning related. Alongside conversation, the artists will be spinning the last of the flax that was grown and processed in Huntly, marking the end of this phase of the project. The Open Studio will be followed by Friday Lunch in the Square Deal shop where project artist Lynne Hocking-Mennie will discuss Flax Turns in relation to her own creative practice (1pm, with lunch).
Come along to 22.5 The Square, Huntly anytime between 11am-12.45pm. The venue is located through the pend connected to Square Deal and will be well signposted. 22.5 The Square is a fully accessible venue. The Open Studio will be taking place on the first floor which can be accessed via a staircase or a lift.
Spinning lessons with artists Daisy Williamson and Lynne Hocking-Mennie, Huntly December 2021
Flax Turns resuming residency at Deveron Projects, Huntly
In the second part of her project, moving from Flax (2019) to Flax Turns (2021-2022) Christine will learn the process of flax spinning, together with textile artists Daisy Williamson and Lynne Hocking-Mennie. Working both in person in Huntly and remotely at home, the three will stay in touch while spinning the flax grown and processed in Huntly by Christine and local participants during 2019. Continuing the project’s entanglement with seasonal practices, the spinning will be done during the darker days of winter, with the accumulated thread ready for weaving in spring 2022.
The starting point of the artist’s interest in the practice of growing and processing flax is Huntly’s heritage as a centre of the Scotland’s linen trade during the late 18th Century. Although largely responsible for the wealth which built modern Huntly, the industry now remains visible only in traces throughout the town’s architecture, green spaces and the course of the River Bogie. During the projects many stages; from sowing to harvesting then processing the flax using replica tools to break, scutch and heckle it to a state ready for spinning. By learning a new succession of related growing and making practices, Christine has tested how we acquire and pass on knowledge as well as questioning why. Working alongside small groups of participants and demonstrating skills to larger groups, her project celebrates the possibility of intimate encounter across time and distance.
The production of linen in the north east of Scotland changed in the 18th Century from a means to generate clothing and items for home and local use, into a thriving industry making cloth for trade in new colonial markets. To obtain the enormous amounts of thread required to weave the cloth, new Boards of Trade established spinning schools for women and girls through-out the Highlands, tapping into what they perceived to be a skilled, ‘workforce’ in waiting. The spinning schools introduced the stationary spinning wheel to replace the traditional drop spindle, an archaic but efficient tool used across the world which enables the spinner to remain mobile as she works. This marked an important power shift for women who had previously been equally involved in all kinds of work relating to the family and community’s sustenance.
Beyond Extraction: In Conversation between Christine Borland and Annalee Davis
screened Tuesday 2 November 2021
An online screening of ‘Beyond Extraction: In Conversation between Christine Borland and Annalee Davis’. Both Borland and Davis’ practices investigate received and ancestral knowledge, and through this the conversation leads them to reflect on new ethics of care for the land around us. Produced by BASH Art Creative, the film sees both artists in discussion exploring similarities in their own practices, their interest in the formation of knowledge and debates around the existence of dominant narratives at the expense of others.
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