Of yore, originally emerged from the Petra collection but went through a material journey of its own. The realization that not every category of yarn that is part of deadstock can be restored through the technique of hand-knotting, led to explorations in non-woven surfaces. Kilos of wool tangled and broken in strands were segregated with an intention to revive the fundamental quality of the material that stayed intact. Industrial felting techniques were explored beginning with the yarn being broken down by the garnetting machine back to its fiber form, making way to a whole new range of possibilities except for the surface’s ability to handle friction similar to that of a floor rug. Each sheet of felt showed how fiber behaved under pressure, how differently colored fibers blended into each other and what the resulting sheets meant.

 

My visual stimulation during the process drew an uncanny resemblance with the indigenous bark cloth, their ways of softening by pounding and then painting to make a mark on it. I began by over-dyeing the felted panel of 8x3’ to then hand-paint intuitively, inspired by aboriginal artisans, with wool-friendly dyes. Guided by the tactility of the panel, the memory of co-creating, and the rhythm of my climbs, it was a process in response to the material itself. The painted surface was then pressed onto with heated iron fragments to create impressions that recede along with natural light. Yarn became fibre, fibre became a surface, surface soaked in color to then be touched by metal, to remind how versatile wool as a material is. 

Something that began in the margins of a warehouse waiting to be discarded ends as something conversational; and all the things it can be if not on the floor, elsewhere.