Heidi comes to us from Thames where she has earned a reputation for her careful considered making. Her practice explore the world of natural fibres and natural pigments. There is a delicate hand on her works as she explores the materials intuitively and drawing on her inner thoughts and feelings.
This is my Medicine.
Work for this exhibition began with a resist paste drawing on an iron dyed linen cloth. I was feeling a little adrift and as I drew, I saw myself navigating the outer reaches of the cosmos, my antennae on high alert… feeling into what I was sensing. My drawing emerged to its own rules, gifting me places to rest and dream. Adrift in a sea of energy, antennae vibrating.
The cloth became my marker for this exhibition, and shows me how to proceed.
My intention is to honour my antennae and their ability to guide me. I dive into the unknown and celebrate what I bring back from this place of mystery. I am interested in what will be revealed, as I work with textile and natural dye, discovering new relationships forming between the processes, revealing and shielding in a dance that upholds my authentic voice. My work parallels my life.
Working my way through a stash of well-loved textiles, choosing those that call me, I work to see what emerges. To have no expectations is a challenge that enables surprise, the sense that what has been birthed was waiting for this moment, for this hand, for this allowing. The results are my offerings.
I recently began experimenting with mordant and resist pastes as a new method of working with the natural dyes and in the process draw an image on linen – ‘feeling adrift in a sea of energy: antennae radiating’. I think it sums up where I am and is a beginning place from which to explore.
In the process of doing this work I have been learning how to play and so a working subtitle has popped up ‘Grandmother’s Sandbox’.
We look forward to seeing where the ‘play’ has taken Heidi and where it will further take her as she stays @ from out of the blue studio gallery for her 6 week residency. Watch this space.