vivonne thwaites
curator
kay lawrence
Lineage 2009
Woven tapestry 3 w/cm
Cotton warp; linen, cotton and wool weft
Each tapestry is approx 37 x 30 cm
Lineage new works by Kay Lawrence AM, Professor of Visual Art, School of Art, Architecture and Design, University of South Australia
'This collection of tea towels presents a kind of lineage. Bought in the 1960's by my grandmother and my great aunt, they were used daily, folded and stacked, passed on to my uncle and finally in 2008 inherited by me. Before they migrated to Australia from the United Kingdom in the late 1920s my grandmother, Blanche, was a children's nanny, my great aunt Amy, an assistant cook in a school. My life has had opportunities unimaginable to young women coming to maturity in the early years of the 20th century. But our lives are linked through the daily routines of domestic life, cooking, cleaning, using cups and bowls, washing and drying them with linen or cotton cloths. Despite the social upheavals and the changing roles of women in the last one hundred years these routines represent a small continuity.
Most of the thirty one tea towels were woven with simple stripes and checks. Stripes are fundamental to the weaving process. They visually describe the structure of the fabric, the repetitive process of laying the weft in the warp, working from side to side to build the cloth row by row. The stripes and checks also recall how these cloths are used, in the repetitive rituals of drying and mopping up that maintain the order of the kitchen.
For me, these simple tapestries based on striped and checked tea towels signify domestic order and familial connection. I was also thinking of the painter Agnes Martin as I made them, particularly the meditative simplicity of her hand drawn lines and grids. But unlike Martin's work, these images do not aim to evoke a transcendent spirituality, but refer to their origins as objects in the physical world casting a slight shadow, at the same time as suggesting in their structure, the repetitive rhythms of the body engaged in domestic work'.
Kay Lawrence April 2011
kay lawrence - cv
Professor Kay Lawrence AM
Director, South Australian School of Art, Art, Architecture and Design, University of South Australia
| RECENT PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE | |
| 2010 | ‘A Woman’s place is in the House. The Women’s Suffrage Centenary Community Tapestries’ Australian Fine & Decorative Art Society Lecture, Melbourne |
| 2010 | ‘Making the Parliament House Embroidery’ Australian Fine & Decorative Art Society Lecture tour, Adelaide and Armidale |
| 2008 | Convenor, Australian Council of University Art and Design Schools Conference, Adelaide |
| 2002 | Consultant, Adelaide Festival 2002 Intertwine event, workshops and forum |
| RECENT PROFESSIONAL APPOINTMENTS | |
| 2011 | Board of the Australian Tapestry Workshop |
| 2004 - 2007 | President, Craft Australia |
| 2002 - 2008 | National Executive, ACUADS Australian Council of Art and Design Schools |
| CURRENT RESEARCH | |
| Oral history project on the Parliament House Embroidery with the National Library of Australia | |
| RECENT SELECTED EXHIBITIONS | |
| 2010 | Power cloths of the Commonwealth, National Crafts Museum, Delhi |
| 2010 | Heartlines, curated by Mary Knights for the 2010 Adelaide Festival |
| 2010 | Quiet Reader, Adelaide Central Gallery, SA |
| 2009 | Distilled Matter, Louis Carlos Bernal Gallery, Tucson, Arizona |
| 2009 | Wangaratta Contemporary Textile Award, Wangaratta exhibitions Gallery, Victoria |
| 2008 | This everything water, South Australian School of Art Gallery, 2008 Adelaide Festival |
| 2006 | 17th Tamworth Textile Biennial In the world: head, hand, heart Tamworth City Gallery, |
| 2004 | Fabrics of Change, Trading Identities Flinders University City Gallery, Adelaide |
| 2002 | Material Culture Australian National Gallery, Canberra |
| 2002 | Weaving the Murray Art Gallery of South Australia & Prospect Gallery then touring SA |
| 2001 | Frisson;13th Tamworth Textile Biennale Tamworth Regional Gallery, touring Australia |
| 2000 | Chemistry Art Gallery of South Australia |
| 1999 | Close Ties , Kay Lawrence and Marcel Marois University of Queensland Art Museum |
| RECENT SELECTED AWARDS, GRANTS | |
| 2010 | Project grant, Arts SA |
| 2009 | Supervisor of the Year, Masters by Research, Division of EASS, UniSA |
| 2007 | Project grant, Arts SA |
| 1998 | H C Coombs Creative Arts Fellow Australian National University |
| 1996-1998 | Australian Research Council small grants $40,000 Significant Women Artists at the South Australian School of Art Kay Lawrence, Cathy Speck |
| 1996 | Fellowship $35,000 Visual Arts/Craft Fund Australia Council |
| 1989 | Member of the Order of Australia (AM) for the Parliament House Embroidery |
| COMMISSIONS | |
| 2002 - 2003 | Commissioned artwork for Glazed Entry, State Library of South Australia |
| 1995 - 1996 | Tapestry Daughter for Art Gallery of South Australia |
| 1990 - 1992 | Tapestry commissioned for Sembler Building St Petersburg, Florida, USA |
| 1987 - 1988 | Tapestry commissioned for the Prime Minister's Suite, new Parliament House, Canberra |
| 1984 - 1986 | Designer and co-ordinator Parliament House embroidery, Parliament House, Canberra |
| ARTIST IN COMMUNITY | |
| 1999 - 2001 | Coordinator Barbara Hanrahan Community Tapestry Project |
| 1993 | Designer Women's Suffrage Centenary Community Tapestries, South Australian Parliament |
| 1989 | Designer Regency Park Community Tapestry, Regency Park Centre for the young disabled |
| 1981-1985 | Salisbury Community Tapestry, Hills Community Tapestry, Crafers School Tapestry, Millicent Community Tapestry |
| COLLECTIONS: | |
| National Gallery of Australia, Art Gallery of South Australia, Art Gallery of Western Australia, Queensland Art Gallery, Queen Victoria Museum and Art and Art Gallery, Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery, Tamworth Art Gallery, Ararat Art Gallery, Parliament House, Canberra, Parliament House, Adelaide, University of South Australia, private collections | |