Tag: Breda Fay

Review: St Brigid’s Cloaks- Brigid 1500 – Kildare Town

Published on by Feltmakers Ireland1 Comment

All photographs are by Breda Fay, except for the Cathedral window by Tamzen Lundy.

Written by Feltmakers Ireland guild member Breda Fay

I took a trip to nearby Kildare town on Saturday, the 27th of January, to visit the launch of the Brigid’s Cloaks exhibition. I love “launches” as they usually provide an opportunity to talk to the artist and I was not disappointed here.

It was a pleasure to meet the manager/director of this project, Lorna McCormack, of the Wool in School programme. From my days [as an educator] “at the chalkface” I have been impressed with the ethos of this school programme, aligned closely with local culture and heritage and Sustainable Development Goals 2030.

Lorna introduced me to lead Artist Michelle Hickey Legge, who described the works. The focus was on using locally sourced Irish wool and sustainable resources. Four stunning St Brigid’s Cloaks were crafted “with an all-encompassing approach to wool heritage and art”, Lorna explained. “With a focus on an all-island approach involving many generations, people across Ireland came together and immersed themselves in heritage crafts and community connections”. Lorna had some amusing stories about how the children chose the placement of their work. She also pointed out some interesting features I might have missed: a knitted piece from one of Seamus Heaney’s aran jumpers featured; one of the cloaks had Brigid Cross motifs included.

A total of 925 were involved, including 250 local school children from the town of Kildare who made pompoms, covered CDs, pieces of wool lace and knitting, each placed onto a cloak.

St Brigid’s Cloaks is a community artwork developed by Wool in School in association with Creative Ireland and Kildare County Council. The exhibition runs until April and will tour the country afterwards.

Where: St Brigid’s Cathedral, Kildare Town.

When: through April 2024, with the cloaks then touring the country.

There is a short video on Instagram of the installation of the show- https://www.instagram.com/reel/C2zPBxII-tH/?igsh=azMxNWJodzlhdWI4

For more information, visit the Wool in School website – https://woolinschool.com/

Editor’s note: Thank you so much, Breda, for sharing your visit to the launch of St Brigid’s Cloaks in the Cathedral in Kildare Town. We love having articles by our community members. If you are a guild member and have an interesting textile event to share, please email us at feltmakersie@gmail.com

Review: Brigid 1500 Art Trail in Kildare

Published on by Feltmakers Ireland

Written by Guild Member Breda Fay

Unravelling an Icon

How could a BREDA not be excited by a Brigid ‘s festival, especially if it’s only 15 km over the road?

Former Feltmakers Ireland chair, Breda Fay, in Kildare town.

On Saturday, I attended the launch of Sult Arists‘ “Unravelling an Icon” in Kildare town, an exciting art exhibition that transformed a town square into an open-air art gallery. Twenty local businesses bought into the idea of exhibiting sixty works in a wide variety of mediums/media of national and international artists in their windows as part of Brigid 1500 celebrations.

A free map and catalogue were available, as well as hot chocolate, cake and savouries (donations to Medicins sans Frontieres). I’m attaching a map in case you are interested and they’re not available later.

How to Find the Artworks

Map of the Artist Trail
Venues that have art.

The Opening

Niamh Wycherly of Maynooth University opened the exhibition with an impressive account of Brigid’s life and works. {There is a short video of her opening on the Sult Artists’ Instagram page – https://www.instagram.com/p/C2nDS0xM9Pp/ }

Despite the cold weather, it was great to meet many friends and/or exhibitors and chat about arty stuff: Liadain Butler, who introduced me to felt many moons ago, Tamzen Lundy and Aisling Hassett from Feltmakers Ireland, muinteoirí (teachers) from Newbridge, and the singers from Kill.

Artwork from Feltmakers Ireland’s Guild Members

Piece by Liadain Butler.
Piece by Tamzen Lundy
Piece by Aisling Hassett
‘ ‘The Shepherdess’ by Theresa Carroll

The exhibition is on for a month…. well worth a visit. There are some lovely coffee shops and eateries in the town square. {It runs through Sunday, the 18th of February}.

Additionally, there is an online art gallery of each piece in the show, which includes the artists’ details, titles of each piece, medium, and social media/links - https://sultartists.com/brigid-1500

To see more of the Feltmakers Ireland members’ works, visit the following links:

Thank you ever so much, Breda, for visiting Kildare to see the Art Trail in Kildare town! We appreciate learning more about the exhibition. – the editors. To learn more about Breda, visit her blog – https://bredafay.com/

Exhibition: Opening This Afternoon – ‘Bountiful’

Published on by Feltmakers Ireland

Today, on the 30th of September, art enthusiasts and admirers of the exquisite craft of felting will gather at the Phoenix Park Visitors Centre in Dublin, Ireland. Feltmakers Ireland’s highly anticipated juried exhibition is set to open its doors to the public at 3 PM.

The exhibition showcases a stunning array of felted artworks that push the boundaries of this ancient textile art form.

As a sneak peek into what promises to be an awe-inspiring show, we bring you exclusive glimpses from four diverse pieces that will be featured in this remarkable exhibition.

Photo 1 – Breda Fay’s wall piece, ‘Torthuil’.

Photo 2 – Valerie OCeallaigh’s ‘Bountiful Love’.

Photo 3 – Adrienne Dempsey’s ‘Where the Wild Things Grow’.

Our exhibition will be opened by Pippa Hackett, Sheep Farmer and Irish Minister for Land Use and Biodiversity. She has kindly written the foreword to our ‘wool project book’, ‘Exploring Irish Wool for Feltmaking’. Copies of the book will be available during the opening and throughout the exhibition.

Lastly, many thanks to the Design and Craft Council of Ireland for helping to fund our 20th-anniversary Floral Tapestry Project.

Close-up detail of our collective felted flower project, a Floral Tapestry, in celebration of Feltmakers Ireland’s 20th-anniversary.

Recap: A New Dress for Brigid – Kildare Heritage Week

Published on by Feltmakers Ireland

By Breda Fay

Community Arts Facilitator Beth Murphy from Willow Wonder came up with an idea to celebrate Brigid 1500 by facilitating a number of community arts workshops. The project began in Feb 2023 and was called “A New Dress for Brigid”. 

Feltmakers Ireland member Liadain Butler represented the craft of Feltmaking.  

A wire form of Brigid was constructed around which there will be tiers of different materials. Designed to be displayed outdoors, these tiers will be made of durable weather-resistant materials or materials that can be replaced periodically. The tiers will be made of copper, felt, crochet and embroidered fabrics; the clay face using model Skye, Liadain’s daughter, felted hair, bark ‘growing baskets’, grass, and rush woven belts will all be included. 

Based in Kildare town, the project brought together a number of craftspeople to explore traditional crafts and share knowledge. Each workshop was led by a different practitioner, allowing the whole group to experience each other’s practices and skills – skills passed down through generations but now in danger of being lost.

These ancient skills and crafts include crochet, embroidery, weaving, felting, sketching, clay, and braiding using natural materials such as wool from the Curragh sheep, grasses, willow, and copper. Many of the skills would have been practised in the time of Brigid using these same locally available materials.

The project will continue into 2024, but Heritage Week has provided an opportunity to view the journey so far. The beautiful setting of the Kildare Cathedral provided a wonderful exhibition space.

The completed piece will be exhibited in the square in Kildare on February 2024 as part of the closing ceremony for Brigid 1500.

The frame is made from steel by @paul.finch999

To learn more, visit the website – https://brigid1500.ie/AboutBrigid1500/

Brigid 1500 still has an Open Call for projects, with a deadline of 15th of September 2023, Find this at Kildare Heritage – https://kildareheritage.com/events/brigid-1500-2024-open-call/

Catch their Kildare Heritage’s Medieval Day today, the 17th of August, from 11 am to 4 pm – https://www.instagram.com/p/CwAFpDUokNe/

Medieval Day
A New Dress for Brigid
The Participants
A Mask for Brigid
Kildare Cathedral

Breda Fay reports on Molly Williams on-line course

Published on by Feltmakers Ireland

Breda Fay reports on her most recently undertaken on line course:

I have just completed an exciting online workshop with Molly Williams called “Contemporary Dancer”.  Six weekly lesson included presentations, videos and downloadable worksheets, illustrating simply and clearly the step-by-step procedure. Weekly online meetings with tutor were timetabled as much as possible to suit participants. Any queries or difficulties  could be discussed with Molly and it was great to see other participants’ progress. Over the six weeks we progressed from making a wire armature skeleton, to covering it with fabric before wet felting horizontal and vertical layers of fibre for the musculature. A large piece of embellished prefelt was then made for the colourful skin which was cut out and sewn onto the model before fulling and shrinkage. There was also an option to make the skin directly onto model. This was the one I chose. Finally  a head dress is designed for the figure before it is finally glued into a plinth. I cannot believe the I’ve got through the six weeks and have a very viable and I think stunning sculpture!

The armature

Molly Williams’ bio

Molly is a textile artist specialising in figurative felt sculpture. Contemporary and Modern dance inform the shapes and movement of the felt sculptures, and figurative shapes are a feature of her textile art. Molly lives in the UK and works from her studio in the garden. She teaches felt sculpture workshops internationally. Molly’s research interest is in Ottoman textiles, costume and ceramics and she has studied Ottoman costume and design to create replica kaftans and pattern design to be used to print textiles, wall art and other products. BA Hons Embroidered Textiles – Middlesex University Qualified Design and Technology Teacher – Christ Church Canterbury University Memberships: Prism Textile Arts Society of Designer Craftsmen International Felt makers Association Websites: www.mollywilliams.co.ukwww.fruitfulyear.co.uk

CIFD and GANS Collaboration.

Published on by Feltmakers Ireland

Report by Breda Fay- GANS rep (edited by Tamzen Lundy)

Breda Fay/ Michelle Kearns
GANS & CIFD collaboration

Since the beginning of April, some members from Felt makers Ireland have been working with designers from the fashion world on a collaborative project linking craft persons and designers.

Today – August 29th– was the culmination of our work, when our projects were modeled as part of the CIFD Fashion Show/ Media Day. The fashion show itself was amazing and one could only be inspired by the address and commentary of Eddie Shanahan, chair of CIFD, a truly enthusiastic and inspiring speaker.

For the last few months, Carmen Garcia, Niki Collier and Breda Fay have been engaging with our partner designers from the council of Irish fashion design. We had been randomly matched to “accentuate learning and ensure innovative engagement”.

I worked with Michelle Kearns, a milliner from Tuam.

Breda Fay/ Michelle Kearns
Breda Fay/ Michelle Kearns
Breda Fay/ Michelle Kearns
Breda Fay/ Michelle Kearns

Michelle and I shared stories of our likes and dislikes, dreams and history to come up with a theme for the design. We also discussed different textures and shades of felt. Samples and photographs went back and forth until we finally decided on a very fine and feathery black Merino and Silk with embellishments of cerise Tussah silk that Michelle would incorporate into a wire structure. The finished work would illustrate overcoming adversity (thick and gnarled branches) growing into more open structure with birds and blooms of hope and resilience.

In all, 15 pairs brought their projects to completion and the resulting hats, baskets, dresses, scarves, etc were amazing. The crafts of calligraphy, metal smith, lace making, felt making, basket making, crochet, textile art and embroidery were all represented.

Carmen Garcia's collaborative work
GANS & CIFD collaboration

This is the second year of the collaboration and I would urge members to watch the GANS page of the website and read the blog posts for notice of next year’s event, when we will once again advertise this opportunity. For those that managed to get along this year and became involved it was certainly and enriching and lasting experience.

See a word from Eddie in thanks below.

www.irishfashiondesigners.com

The below was received from the Council of Irish Fashion Designers

Ladies & Gentlemen,

On behalf of all of us in CIFD I wish to express our gratitude to you for the skill, inspiration, dedication and creativity you brought to our collaboration project.

It is not often that one of Ireland’s most eminent journalists declares an event as ‘Triumphant and emotional’ – but those were her first words at the end of our presentation on Thursday.

My colleagues and I have enjoyed the process, our respect and admiration for your skills is difficult to put into words. Design and Craft came together last week in an engaging evocation of Irish culture, proving beyond doubt that our heritage crafts can be extremely engaging in a contemporary context.

I hope you too enjoyed the project and the presentation.

I know Mary has exciting plans to give the work further exposure and I will also be seeking extra opportunities in the coming months.

We can expect some newspaper and magazine publicity in the coming weeks. In the meantime I am sending you a hi res image of your contribution by WeTranfer. I hope to have some video clips of the pieces in the next short while and will also forward those in due course.

I look forward to the possibility of working with you again in the near future.

Best regards,

Eddie