Analytics Consent

We use analytics to understand better how people are using this site.

Permit Google Analytics?

Yes No
Skip to main content
Read page text
page 12
first person WOMEN’S WORK Artist Vanessa Marr explains how The Women and Domesticity Duster Project is reaching out to women everywhere I’m known in some circles simply as ‘The Duster Lady’. Since 2014 I’ve been running a project exploring the relationship between women and domesticity, inviting women to embroider their perspectives and experiences around domesticity onto a traditional yellow duster. The decision to work with dusters and embroidery came about from my research into the domestic origins of fair y tales and my discovery of their historical role as narratives told by and to empower women. Later these tales were adapted by men who re-wrote women as vulnerable characters in need of rescue and protection. For example: the now better-known male interpretation of Little Red Riding Hood introduced the woodcutter or huntsman who rescues the young girl; early aural versions told by women had the girl and her grandmother successfully tricking and defeating the wolf all by themselves. The women told these tales as they worked with stitch and cloth, or while cooking, cleaning and looking after their children. As a working mother I can relate to this, and the creation of my ar twork often mirrors this process. I make my ar t on the train on my way to work, around family commitments, and as dinner cooks. My research becomes ar t becomes life – and ultimately a record of self. y first work was a series of seven dusters called Promises and Expectations that reimagined fair y tales promises told to women and girls.This expanded into The Women & Domesticity Duster Project (which also inspired my PhD). I selected dusters as an aide to visualising the invisibility of domestic tasks because they are mundane, unadorned and ignored.The traditional duster style I’ve selected has a sense of nostalgia too and is appealing in its vivid yellow; a reference to the comfort of domesticity. Today, the project’s growing collection of over one hundred hand-embroidered dusters reveals a multitude of opinions, which include poetic quotes, statements, images and sculptural manipulations. The women’s hand-stitched words and images present a broad range of perspectives including fulfilment, resentment, nostalgia, pleasure and antipathy. For example, Family Life: Where are my underpants! and I’m not the Keeper of Your Underpants by Linda Carter and Pip Carter is a paired response by a mother and daughter, telling the tale of the husband’s and father’s missing underpants. Although presented humorously it apparently resulted in quite an argument. Responsibility for items to be laundered often falls to the one who washes them, rather than the owner of the clothes – many women have said they relate to this. Nonchalance, Irritation, Anger, Rage by Amy Mallet and Whenever I Hoover… by Penelope Chong both relate to a shared sense of anger at having to do the cleaning, and is frequently expressed, par ticularly so with these two dusters. Both women resent the fact the job is assumed to be their responsibility and not that of other family members. Patterns of behaviour are also evident; they pretend not to care but eventually concede and clean under a cloud of burning anger. Duty (with Reference to Modern Day Living) by Jackie Batey imagines a modern-day magic wand: press the right buttons and technology will do it all for you.The humorous play on words references a PlayStation game involving warfare. Jackie also implies a battle between ‘tea and buffet par ties’ and ‘domestic help’, an amusing scenario that questions the role of domesticity in modern day life. When seeking out the words to express oneself, poetry can provide these. Several women selected poems, which 12 EMBROIDERY March April 2021
page 13
Right: Vanessa Marr working on Covid Duster Story Quilt, 2019. Marr is currently working on a quilt made from dusters, which visualises her experiences of the Covid-19 lockdown, in particular the challenges of balancing work, family and domestic life. PHOTO: DAVID GARVIN Below from left: A selection of dusters from the original call for contributions in 2014. Jackie Batey, Call of Duty. Christine Chester, Domestic Memories Duster, 2015. Helen Gibbs, Clean Up or Clear Out, 2015. Left: A selection of dusters on display in a Brighton Pop-Up as part of a pre-Pride exhibition exploring sexuality, July 2015. IMAGES COURTESY THE ARTIST was an interesting link to my own practice as I also wrote poetry whilst embroidering my original dusters. In Poetr y – We are But Dust and Shadows, the quote stitched by Karen organ is a reflective perspective on an old te t she liked the idea that whilst the poet was busy philosophizing, his wife was getting on with more practical tasks. In my own work I’m exploring how the experience of stitching into an object, which relates to its given theme, contributes to and transforms collective narratives of expression. I describe the rhythm of piercing and stitching the dusters as ‘drawing with thread’ in order to separate it from the practice of embroidered embellishment, and to establish it as an embodiment of experience. Sometimes my work depicts a literal illustration, at other times my marks are more intuitive. However, at the heart of my purpose is the role of embroidery as a means of engaging with a cloth object that visually ‘speaks’ of the context I’m investigating. I use the object to tell a visual story. Mediating the Materiality of the Duster (2018) is a work I created for the University of Brighton, Creative Futures Marks Make Meaning exhibition. Over the course of one month in my home, I drew daily with stitches on a duster, covering it with intuitive marks that responded to its materiality and significance as a mundane domestic object.The repetitive process of sewing also mimicked the patterns of domestic chores, such as wiping, which we do often without conscious thought. During the pandemic, I expanded the project on Instagram, inviting responses to the domestic experiences of lockdown at @domesticdusters.The project shows no signs of slowing down, with international submissions now also finding their way to me. I’m also inviting submissions as par t of an open call for a physical exhibition planned for summer 2021, Covid permitting.The call is open to people from all walks of life without prejudice – ar tists or not. Every example submitted will included in the collection, which will be displayed on lengths of washing line using traditional clothes pegs.You can contact me via Instagram or the blog for fur ther details. e domesticdusters.wordpress.com I selected dusters as an aide to visualising the invisibility of domestic tasks because they are mundane, unadorned and ignored March April 2021 EMBROIDERY 13

Page Text

View plaintext

first person

WOMEN’S

WORK

Artist Vanessa Marr explains how The Women and Domesticity Duster Project is reaching out to women everywhere

I’m known in some circles simply as ‘The Duster Lady’. Since 2014 I’ve been running a project exploring the relationship between women and domesticity, inviting women to embroider their perspectives and experiences around domesticity onto a traditional yellow duster. The decision to work with dusters and embroidery came about from my research into the domestic origins of fair y tales and my discovery of their historical role as narratives told by and to empower women. Later these tales were adapted by men who re-wrote women as vulnerable characters in need of rescue and protection. For example: the now better-known male interpretation of Little Red Riding Hood introduced the woodcutter or huntsman who rescues the young girl; early aural versions told by women had the girl and her grandmother successfully tricking and defeating the wolf all by themselves. The women told these tales as they worked with stitch and cloth, or while cooking, cleaning and looking after their children. As a working mother I can relate to this, and the creation of my ar twork often mirrors this process. I make my ar t on the train on my way to work, around family commitments, and as dinner cooks. My research becomes ar t becomes life – and ultimately a record of self. y first work was a series of seven dusters called Promises and Expectations that reimagined fair y tales promises told to women and girls.This expanded into The Women & Domesticity Duster Project (which also inspired my PhD). I selected dusters as an aide to visualising the invisibility of domestic tasks because they are mundane, unadorned and ignored.The traditional duster style I’ve selected has a sense of nostalgia too and is appealing in its vivid yellow; a reference to the comfort of domesticity. Today, the project’s growing collection of over one hundred hand-embroidered dusters reveals a multitude of opinions, which include poetic quotes, statements, images and sculptural manipulations. The women’s hand-stitched words and images present a broad range of perspectives including fulfilment, resentment, nostalgia, pleasure and antipathy. For example, Family Life: Where are my underpants! and I’m not the Keeper of Your Underpants by Linda Carter and Pip Carter is a paired response by a mother and daughter, telling the tale of the husband’s and father’s missing underpants. Although presented humorously it apparently resulted in quite an argument. Responsibility for items to be laundered often falls to the one who washes them, rather than the owner of the clothes – many women have said they relate to this. Nonchalance, Irritation, Anger, Rage by Amy Mallet and Whenever I Hoover… by Penelope Chong both relate to a shared sense of anger at having to do the cleaning, and is frequently expressed, par ticularly so with these two dusters. Both women resent the fact the job is assumed to be their responsibility and not that of other family members. Patterns of behaviour are also evident; they pretend not to care but eventually concede and clean under a cloud of burning anger. Duty (with Reference to Modern Day Living) by Jackie Batey imagines a modern-day magic wand: press the right buttons and technology will do it all for you.The humorous play on words references a PlayStation game involving warfare. Jackie also implies a battle between ‘tea and buffet par ties’ and ‘domestic help’, an amusing scenario that questions the role of domesticity in modern day life. When seeking out the words to express oneself, poetry can provide these. Several women selected poems, which

12 EMBROIDERY March April 2021

Read next page

My Bookmarks

Buy this Book
Skip to main content