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The Edinburgh seven tapestry (practice cloths) 2024
Details:
A triptych of handwoven tapestries made from cotton, linen and nylon yarn.
Dims; 190cm x 246cm, 246cm x 190cm, 190cm x 192cm (Installation dimensions variable)
Location:
Staircase, Edinburgh Futures Institute, Edinburgh University, UK
Photography:
David Parry, Neil Hanna, Dovecot, Ross Sinclair
Links:
Edinburgh Futures Institute
Dovecot
V&A event Youtube
Downloads:
The Journal of Scottish Yarns, Carol Richardson
DESCRIPTION
The tapestry is a tribute to the ‘Edinburgh Seven’; Sophia Jex-Blake, Isabel Thorne, Edith Pechey, Matilda Chaplin, Helen Evans, Mary Anderson and Emily Bovell, who in 1869, were the first women to matriculate at any British university. The women’s fight to graduate and qualify as doctors was ultimately unsuccessful, as the Court of Session, Scotland’s Supreme Court, ruled that they should never have been allowed to matriculate. The women’s efforts attracted support and eventually led to the Medical Act of 1876, which legally permitted women to practice medicine. The University of Edinburgh awarded the seven women posthumous degrees, which were collected by female undergraduates in 2019.
Commissioned by Dovecot, with funding from Sir Ewan and Lady Brown, artist Christine Borland designed the tapestry, in close collaboration with Dovecot weavers. An important inspiration for the tapestry was the historical, practical, material and symbolic properties of cloth. Borland used motion capture technology to record the movements of cloths in acts associated with care. “Borland is tapping into some of the most ancient associations between women and healing, and the very creation of life itself. In Norse mythology, the Norns are the spinners of fate, sitting at the base of the great tree that represents the world, Yggdrasil. In Ancient Greece, Arachne was a proud weaver who challenged Athena, goddess of wisdom as well as weaving, and was turned into a spider for her hubris. Zhi Nu is the brightest in the sky. These are weaver goddesses weaving the heaven’s celestial canopies which wrap the world itself.”
The artist’s designs were produced as two-dimensional digital prints and the Dovecot weavers alonside Christine, developed complex processes to interpret them. Through shading, pattern, and negative space, the tapestries on the loom took on a vivid, three-dimensional quality that reflected Borland’s research processes. The tapestries were brought to life with both traditional and modern techniques, using linens, cotton, and nylon yarns. Unlike traditional tapestry, the artwork has an organic shape based on a cellular structure in motion, and is installed as a sculptural forms hovering between two and three dimensions. Cotton, linen, and nylon yarn, and cotton warp create light and shadow, while the nylon weft adds transparency and reflective shine.
The tapestry was launched at the V&A Museum, London, to mark International Women’s Day on 8 Mach, 2024. The launch included an event with V&A Interim Director of Collections James Robinson, in conversation with Dovecot Master Weaver Naomi Robertson, Artist Christine Borland Dr Anne-Marie Coriat, Registrar of the University of Edinburgh’s College of Medicine and Veterinary Medicine. The Edinburgh Seven Tapestry is on view from July 2024 at the new Edinburgh Futures Institute at the University of Edinburgh, Scotland.
Text adapted from Dovecot/EFI press releases.
Quote from The Journal of Scottish Yarns, Issue 5, Carol Richardson