Red Shirt/ Blue shirt

Red Shirt and Blue Shirt are two garments in a continuous process of repair. Neither is finished. Both are returned to regularly, accumulating repair, stitch and patch over time as the fabric ages and the thinking develops.

Red Shirt began as a pyjama top in need of mending. Over six years it has become a record of personal change, the repairs increasing in frequency as the original fabric wears thin. The mending is the process.

Blue Shirt was my husband’s shirt, worn through and cast off. It is being worked in kantha style, a tradition rooted in Bangladesh, slowly populated with fish and river plants. A garden shirt slowly being rewilded as a river.

When exhibited, I was an artist in residence at the Tower Gallery and used the space to work on them when the gallery was open as well as to offer visitors a chance to join me in conversation and workshop about repair. Participants were encouraged to bring an item they wanted to repair and share stories of the item’s history and value. In exchange I gave participants a handmade zine on repair, resilience and transformation.