The bedsheet: from linen cupboard to art gallery
Ayling-Smith, Beverly (2018) The bedsheet: from linen cupboard to art gallery. Textile: cloth and culture, 16 (3). pp. 287-300. ISSN 1475-9756 (Print); 1751-8350 (Online)
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The choice of material in the creation of artwork is vital to the communication of the meaning of the work. Bedsheets act as silent witnesses to many natural processes in life such as birth, puberty, pleasure, disease, decay, and death. At a time of day when we are wearing little clothing, or perhaps none at all, the bedsheet is in contact with the body for many hours every night, soaking up sweat and bodily fluids to create a very personal cloth impregnated with the identity of a person. The bedsheet can become a material on which to literally or metaphorically write our meanings and messages to the world. This article will discuss the materiality of the bedsheet, an everyday and humble cloth. It will reference the work of artists, including Ewa Kuryluk who used sheets in her work, and draw on my own research into the use of materials to carry metaphors of grief and loss. It will be illustrated by my recent works using bedsheets to make a connection with the emotions of the viewer.
Originally given as a paper at The Matter of Material conference at Turner Contemporary in 2017, and published within a special edition of Textile: Cloth and Culture, jointly edited between Professor Lesley Millar and Dr Beverly Ayling-Smith.
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