Common Threads is the graduate exhibition of the 2022 CCAD Art Textile students. A culmination of their work across a two year span will be on show at the MTU CCAD Gallery, 46 Grand Parade, Cork from Monday May 30th to Friday 3rd of June 2022. The work encompasses many varied and interesting themes, techniques and materials, from wall hung pieces to sculptural ones. There is something of interest here for all.
The organisation and curation of this exhibition was carried out by the students and the show will be opened by Trish Brennan, Head of Department at Fine Art & Applied Art, MTU at 5.00 pm on Monday 30th May. We look forward to welcoming you.
We are delighted to say that applications for Future Makers 2022 opened last week. With a total prize-fund of €25,000 and 26 awards and supports available, Future Makers is one of Europe’s largest prize-funded awards programmes.
As we look ahead to the 2022 programme, we are reminded of the opportunities that Future Makers presents.
Not only do the winners receive substantial funds and promotional opportunities, but they also qualify for the annual RDS Craft Awards competition, which awards five makers with €10,000 each.
We were delighted that the following Future Makers 2021 winners received an RDS Craft Award recently:
Katharina Treml – Ceramics (Overall Winner in the Student Category)
This really brings home how impactful the Future Makers programme is and how it helps to elevate the careers of so many. It’s also critical that we as a community support programmes such as this, so that we continue to have a healthy pipeline of makers in Ireland.
To that end, we would kindly ask you to help us spread the word, that applications are now open, by liking and sharing our social media posts, or by sharing the details of the programme with your network.
If you are a student or emerging maker why not apply to this prestigious programme? You can enter for free at futuremakers.ie. and the closing date for applications is Friday 29th July 2022.
Just a reminder that it’s AGM time of year again and this year we’ll be together after two years of zoom. It’ll be instead of the Sunday Session on the 15th MAY.
We’ve a new venue too , thanks to Lorna Cady, which we hope may become our other new home.
It is the CIE Sports and Social Clubhouse in Inchicore. 1 Library Square, also known as West Terrace but more importantly the postcode is D08 PA07. I’ll forward the link on google maps closer to the date.
Dublin Bus from town : 40 and 79
Below is the outline of the running order for the meeting to start promptly at 10.30am with the usual reports and addresses from the committee members. Two guest speakers will share a little about themselves and their practices followed by coffee and refreshments, chat and a “Lucky Dip”. We will aim to move swiftly through official business to have more time for the social bit. Because let’s face it, we’re really good at that bit and we’ve really missed it.
We are asking everyone , who might like to, to bring a small secret parcel of felting materials ( fibre, fabrics, embellishments etc..) max €5- €10ish to be a surprise lucky dip! Anybody who brings a bag gets to receive a lucky dip bag, but there is no obligation to participate.
We’d also like to suggest that everyone bring cake, buns or whatever as is normally done for the AGM. There’ll be plenty of tea and coffee.
You must be a member to attend, but you can renew your membership at the door if you have not joined already.
Finally, if there is anything that you’d would like added to the agenda it must be sent to the Secretary by 5th May. That’s 10 days before the meeting as is written in the constitution.
Another hugely successful Sunday Session was thoroughly enjoyed by all who attended. Juliane Gorman who recently moved to Dublin from America delighted us with her hat demonstration. Juliane makes hats, lots of them. Every colour and whimsical shape under the sun. The word whimsical certainly sums up her creative array of samples she brought for us to see and try on.
Juliane described to us how the different methods of laying out the fibres affected the final shape of each hat and doesn’t even use hat blocks! There’s grid laying, bullseye laying and circular clockwise and anti clockwise laying. Each hat generally has four layers with each layer a different colour. Though she admitted that is purely for her to keep track with which layer she’s working on in case she gets distracted. You know the usual – collecting kids, putting on a wash, collecting kids, putting on a wash, collecting ……
Juliane brought 2 unfinished berets to show the various stages of her process. One was half laid out the other pre felted and ready for final felting. Both were huge, approx 45-50 cm diameter
The kettle was boiled, the water sprayed and the rolling began. We, at the back of the room were amazed at how gently she was rolling and still it shrank beautifully.
The second piece needed another layer of fibre and the “ icing “ layer as Juliane calls it. That’s the decorating part. The nice bit! But we ran out of time to see it completed.
To conclude, everyone was so inspired that it was agreed that we’d love to do a hands on workshop. So whether Juliane knows it or not we’ll be booking her in for the autumn!
We invite you to celebrate EMERGENCE – ArtNetdlr Exhibition Launch this Thursday 14 April, with ArtNetdlr friends & artists, and all creative community of Dun Laoghaire – Rathdown, and a JAZZ Quintet. Emergence, a group exhibition curated by invited artists Jay Murphy and Louise Neiland, featuring the work of over seventy artists from dlr is now on view at Walters. You can also explore and buy artwork online.
Members Annika Berglund and Niki Collier included in exhibition.
As you know, Feltmakers Ireland started a wool research project in Spring last year, with funding from the Crafts Council. It was meant to wrapped up by now with a launch and the publication of a book.
The project got delayed by the loss of our studio and various lockdowns last year, but we see this as an opportunity to widen the scope of the project. We only got started looking for wool mid to end of the summer last year, and although we were very successful in sourcing many breeds, some farmers told us we should be asking around shearing time.
For these reasons we have rolled over the project, and are actively looking for more wool breeds to test.
We are also in the position to accept new testers to the project. If you want to participate you will need to be able to devote a couple of hours a week for about a month, maybe two to do flat wet felting, 3D wet felting and/or needle felting. This is a great opportunity to familiarise yourself with different wool types from sheep bred in Ireland. We will supply wool and a test sheet to be filled out. Enquiries to be sent to hello@feltmakersireland.com.
These are the breeds we have been testing so far:
Belclaire
BFL
BFL ram X Scott Mt ewes
Bleu du Maine
Cheviot
Cladoir
Clun Forest
Dorset
Galway
Hampshire Downes
Hebridean
Herdwick
Jacob
Kerry Hill
Romney
Ryeland
Scotch Blackface
Shetland
Shropshire
Suffolk
Texel
Valais Blacknose
Wensleydale
Zwartbles
And new breeds coming soon (we hope):
Roscommon Lamb, Soay, Portland, Vendeen, badgerfaced texel, Ile de France
Dutch Spotted Lamb
Castlemilk Moorit (only 2 flocks in Ireland)
Charolais Ram X Llyn ewe = lambswool shorn early
If you know of any source for wool from other breeds reared in ireland, please get in touch.
The Tapestry and Fibre Art Festival Roscommon festival weekend kicks off on Thursday 28th April with the launch of an exhibition by the members of Contemporary Tapestry Artists Ireland CTA.
On 29th April Interconnections 4 in Roscommon Arts Centre will launch, and a series of workshops will take place on Saturday 30th April.
PROGRAMME OF EVENTS
Friday April 29th: Launch of Interconnections 4. An exhibition of handwoven fine art tapestries
This exhibition is the fourth in an ongoing biennial collaboration between contemporary tapestry artists from Scotland and Ireland. The first and second Interconnections exhibitions were shown in Roscommon and Boyle in 2016 and 2018, the 2020 exhibition was online due to Covid restrictions.
In 2022 INTERCONNECTIONS 4 will open in Roscommon Arts Centre 29th April – 14th May and will tour to The Granary Gallery, Weston Park, Shropshire for June, July and August. 2022
The exhibition will consist of a number of one-off hand-woven tapestries of all sizes from miniature to massive, on a large range of themes. The tapestries have been made over the past four years by the 8 participating professional tapestry artists, 4 from Ireland and 4 from Scotland. Visitors to the exhibition can expect to be blown away by the beauty, colour and sheer technical virtuosity of the work.
Contemporary tapestries are made by hand on simple looms, in the same way as the historic tapestries we see when we visit castles and country houses. The technique is a very ancient one and almost impossible to mechanise. The subject matter and style is contemporary with pieces dealing with the issues of the day as well as abstract and more representational themes.
The exhibition has been co-curated by Frances Crowe (Ireland) and Joan Baxter (Scotland) both well respected tapestry artists in their own countries. They first met in 2012 and when a chance to exhibit together in Ireland presented itself in 2016 it rapidly grew into a larger and more important project for the artists of both countries. The opportunity to exhibit together regularly allows the participating artists to forge creative links, to collaborate on a number of other projects, to form friendships and learn from each other.
Exhibiting Artists:
Ireland: Frances Crowe, Mary Cuthbert, Terry Dunne, Angela Forte Scotland: Joan Baxter, John Brennan, Clare Coyle, Elizabeth Radcliffe
Interconnections is funded by Roscommon County Council Creative Ireland Programme 2022 and Roscommon Local Enterprise Office, supported by Roscommon Arts Centre and King House.
This is very short notice, but we only received this information today. We are sharing it anyway in case you can take advantage despite the short notice.
Bloom 2022 – Applications Now Open for the Irish Craft Village
Applications are now open for Bloom 2022 which takes place in the Pheonix Park, Dublin, from 2nd to 6th June, 2022. The event represents opportunities for craft makers to promote and sell their products to over 100,000 people over 5 days.
Applications are invited from artists and practitioners based in Ireland working with locally sourced natural materials to participate in forthcoming exhibition Timpeallacht.
After a two year postponement, we have finally put the plans in place to bring you an online zoom workshop with the world renowned felt maker NANCY BALLESTEROS from TREETOPS COLOURS, Australia. The workshop will take place on MAY 28th 9-12am and will be a MEMBERS ONLY workshop at a cost of 30 euro. Limited to 30 participants. There will be a follow up, in person, meet up a few weeks after to catch up, finish or discuss our endeavours with each other. Sadly Nancy won’t be there in person though! Most importantly, to participate in this workshop there is a video that Nancy wants us to watch beforehand.
If you are interested, we would encourage you to sign up quickly as there is growing interest from non members worldwide to join Feltmakers in order to take part in this workshop. Nancy is passing on the information to those who enquire about workshops she is doing. If you’ve got a membership that needs renewing ,maybe now is a good time!
That and workshop enquiries can be made by emailing us at
Postage has also resumed from Australia so if you’re tempted by visiting Nancy’s shop and maybe purchasing, she is sure to get orders out asap. Treetopscolours.com.au
This is planned to be an annual event held at Ballylongford Mill in North Kerry.
The first Fair will be held over the weekend of 30-31 July, 2022 where Irish traditional trades and craftspeople from all over the country will talk about and demonstrate their work.
It’ll be a family friendly weekend with old fashioned fairground games for the kids, food and entertainment and lots of traditional crafts for sale.
There will be a wide variety of trades and crafts on display, from Longbow makers to Coppersmiths, Feltmakers to Musical Instrument makers, Basketmakers to Blacksmiths.
So far there are 26 different trades and craftspeople confirmed, and we hope to have more by the time of the Fair.
We are writing this blog post to tell you that Feltmakers Ireland hope to participate at this event, provided we have enough members that can commit to volunteer to demonstrate and help out. If you are interested in working with us to give a good showing at this event, please contact us on hellofeltmakersireland@gmail.com
We also want to tell you that this is coming up if you would like to participate as an individual.
Ballylongford Mill is a collection of early nineteenth century industrial buildings on two-thirds of an acre in the middle of the village of Ballylongford, which comprises the old working port of the village.
It includes the five storey Mill, originally built as a grain drying store in 1846, the Creamery and Famine Hospital which both appear on the 1851 map of the village, and a large buried eighteenth century boat dock in the centre of the site, which will be excavated and reinstated as a dock for wooden boats.
All of the buildings have been disused for a number of years, but work is about to start on the restoration of the buildings and walled yards which make up the old port of Ballylongford.
Feltmakers Ireland 