Have you heard about this amazing new project? “In a war someone has to die” is an amazing new collaborative embroidery project by Hanne Bang.

From Hanne:

A couple of years ago I happened to zap by a TV program, in which a journalist was interviewing a professional African soldier. To the soldier`s great disappointment he was out of work at the moment – because there was no war in his region.
The interviewer asked the soldier if he was afraid of dying, and the soldier said: “No I am not afraid of dying. Are you afraid of dying?” The interviewer answered: “Yes I am afraid of dying”. Then the soldier said, without any sentimentality: “In a war someone has to die”.
This little dialogue, and the words “In a war someone has to die”, returned to me over and over again. Of course I knew that in wars people die, but suddenly I saw the essence of war and the reality of it very clearly.
These words are the main element in the art project. I use this sentence – these harsh words – in a feminine expression, as handkerchiefs and embroidery are.

You can participate in this project by visiting the website or the facebook page. I can’t wait to see the finished result!

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Every now and then you stumble across something and think ‘gee, I’d totally tattoo that on myself’.  Well, this year I had one of those moments and went with it.

I’ve always thought I’d wait until I was at least 30 before I got a tattoo. I had that gut instinct that if I did something like that before then I’d most probably end up regretting it. I was a fickle young thing.

So for the last couple of years I have seriously contemplated a couple of ideas. I did get very close to a cross stitch design. Figured I needed to stitch it up before embarking on actual ink. And after I had done that, decided it would be a bit big for what I wanted.

I’m a collector of old craft. Either finished pieces or the things people use to make with. I have lots of old needle cases and needle books. Tons of old needles, wool winders, thimbles, you get my drift. A couple of months ago I bought this simply gorgeous antique souvenir sewing kit. It didn’t take long for me to realise that THIS was what was going on me forever.

Click here to see the other images of the box. It is such a delightful object, I am going to treasure it for a very long time!

I’m the kind of person that believes in the importance of signs. It’s crucial to remind yourself of the messages you hold true. Some people hang stuff on the wall, pin things to their office cubicles, embroider samplers, paint on footpaths. I have a small affirmation stuck on the inside of my wardrobe door, I have pictures on my walls, and a vast collection of button badges I can pop out for the right moment.

It’s Never Too Late To Mend, is very much a motto for me. I apply it to craft, politics, our lovely planet, my relationships and communities. And now I proudly wear my motto on my arm to help me keep on track for the rest of my life.

A massive thanks to Matt Gordon who was working out of Down to Earth Tattoos for his beautiful work. He was so much fun to hang out with!

And another massive thanks to Mark Burban for the great pic. I did some really great work with Mark and will be revealing more on that project soon!

Now, get mending!

xxx

rayna

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It’s been a bit quiet around here as I’ve been very busy stitching!

For those of you who have been following the progress of the WE are Wyndham Vale project, the photos in this post are all progress shots for you to check out. Submissions closed last week and there was some truly visionary ideas contributed to the project.  I can just imagine all of the ideas coming to life and Wyndham Vale becoming  a truly sustainable and vibrant community!

I am in the throes of stitching now and I invite anyone who wants to join in to come down to Iramoo and get involved. I’ll be there in the kitchen stitching for the following sessions next week:
Monday (25th Jul), Wednesday (27th), Thursday (28th), Monday (1st Aug) from 11.30-2.30.

If you have always wanting to learn embroidery, come along and I will give you a lesson. Or if you’ve been stitching since birth, and everyone in between, come along and stitch your favourite part of the map. All materials are provided.  We’ll be hanging in the kitchen stitching, drinking tea, and eating cake! If you haven’t been there before and want to come along the Iramoo community centre is at 84 Honour Avenue, Wyndham Vale.

I have a date for the unveiling too. Stay tuned for news on that another exciting workshop!

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On the same day that the Wyndham Weekly reported I was to be the new Artist in Residence at Iramoo, Delfin Lend Lease announced a new $1B property development on the fringes of Wyndham Vale.  This yet to be publicly named development will house up to 12,000 people within 4000 dwellings.  According to media reports (but surprisingly nothing on Delfin Lend Lease’s website) there are plans for four schools, community, sport and recreation facilities, open space with lakes and waterways, and a shopping centre.

Like all master planned developments, this estate will be designed and branded with a specific theme(s) of housing and will be sold in staged releases of house and land packages.

Since then yet another large development has been announced for the area. Raising even more questions about the pressures all this rapid development is going to place on already stressed infrastructure.

Far too often the values and long term goals of existing communities are left out of the design and planning processes.  While councils may develop long term goals for their area, in areas of rapid growth it seems clear to me that corporate developers have much more power and control over the social and environmental development than the community or local government. Add on top the differing levels of decision making responsibilities between local and state government, it does all get a bit confusing for local people who do want to participate in planning processes.  I can’t speak for the Wyndham Vale community because I don’t know the specific history of the relationships between the council/state government and the developers operating in the area. But I do know that of the many conversations I’ve had with locals about the history of the evolution of Wyndham Vale, these issues seem to be very much at play here.

Reflecting on these issues, I would like to present the major project for my residency, “WE are Wyndham Vale”.

I invite all residents of Wyndham Vale to contribute their future visions and exciting ideas for the area.  All of the submissions are to be incorporated into a large visual wall map of the area. The map will then be embroidered for exhibition, alongside the submissions.  Participation is easy, simply download the submission form, print it out, fill it in and email or post it in or drop it off at one of the drop boxes around Wyndham by the end of 8th of July (details on the form).

Once all the submissions are collected and the design is collated, I will be holding public stitching sessions for people to get involved in the making of the map.  You can indicate if you want to be involved in this part of the project on the contribution form.

My hope is for a community vision of the priorities local residents hold important for the future of this area. The map will be framed and kept on display in the Iramoo Community Centre.

So please download the contribution form by clicking the get involved button below and get thinking about what YOU see Wyndham Vale’s future looking like.

Finally a special big thanks to the Iramoo Community Centre and Wyndham Council for getting behind this unique project.

Looking forward to seeing your ideas!

xox
Rayna

click the button above to download the submission form (.pdf 61kb)

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“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it’s the only thing that ever does” Margaret Mead

In this time of global environmental and economic crisis, the looming challenges can sometimes seem insurmountable, especially considering Australia is one of the biggest carbon consuming countries per capita on our lovely planet.

While the challenge to turn this around may seem enormous, it’s not impossible to meet. One of the most important and effective changes we need to take on is our relationship with stuff. Indeed it is our obsession with material things that is such a massive contributor to our environmental excesses.

While the mainstream media might still be consumed with the debate as to whether climate change is a human-created problem, or even exists in the first place, most Australians are getting on with the job and working towards solutions. From the direct action activists placing themselves between the trees and the chainsaws, to the vast hordes of cyber campaigns, to the school kitchen gardens, to earthships, the solutions are as diverse and inspiring as the communities working on them.

The craft community is no exception. While the same capitalist consumerist pressures exist within the craft world, you would be hard pressed to find a crafter who hadn’t spent some time thinking about the social and environmental ramifications of their making. In fact, many centre their crafting around finding different ways to reuse old materials or to make statements about their vision of the way the world could be.

As a community we are fantastic at cheering each other on. Of all the different worlds I interact with, none is so happy and enthusiastic as the crafters. What we aren’t too hot at is calling each other out on our naughty stuff. What I really don’t see enough in the craft world is crafters questioning the world around them, and their craft within the context of that. Craft does not exist in a vacuum. Issues of sustainability, economics, sexism, racism and cultural appropriation, homophobia and all the other phobias do impact our making. Identifying and challenging those issues need not be scary or dramatic, but it is important to do.

Sustainability is one of the easiest ways to check out our attitudes. For makers, we can firstly ask if we are really makers or are we just consumers and hoarders? We’re all a little bit guilty of stashing, but it’s good to check in every now and then and make sure your stash isn’t requiring a whole house of its own. If it is, the time has definitely come to start being an actual maker again! And of course, it’s important to check out where your supplies actually come from. No point making your own stuff in protest at the sweatshop industry when all your supplies come from sweatshops. Buying less supplies but making sure it’s locally made not only has a big impact environmentally but also makes a significant difference to the local craft community.

One of the harder challenges for those of us makers is to ask ourselves if the world really needs the things we make. There I said it. Yes, there can only be so many fabric covered button badges, beaded bracelets and wall decals. What there isn’t enough of is shoes for school children, menstrual pads for school girls and warm clothes for homeless people. I’m not saying that we have to use our craft to save the world all the time. But we should ask if our craft is directly unsaving the world. I used to make cross stitch kits. But one day I realized I was sending the majority of them to America and it seemed to be a pretty big waste. You can already buy cross stitch fabric, embroidery thread and needles in America so why post them there? Now I sell electronic copies of my patterns instead. It’s a lot less resource intensive and my customers get the design instantly. Not only am I now using less transport miles and packaging, I am providing a better service to my customers. Proving the point of environmental campaigners that doing business sustainably is not only better for the environment, but it’s a smarter way of doing things.

What our world really needs is less stuff. Not in a minimalist, bland boring kind of way. But a surround yourself in brilliant, useful, locally made inspiring stuff way. Crafters and makers have such a brilliant long history of leading the way when it comes to adapting to new environments and demands for better ways of doing things. Wouldn’t it be fantastic to see the craft scene leading the way as role models in the environment movement?

However uncertain our future is, one thing we can be sure of is our survival as a species relies on our capacity to get truly creative and embrace the challenges of a post-carbon future. Can’t get much craftier than that!

xxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Rayna Fahey is a local craft artist. She co-founded the Craft Cartel with Casey Jenkins and runs radicalcrossstitch.com Rayna is a self-described craft evangelist and loves nothing more than finding new ways to combine her love of craft, hanging outside, gardening and subverting the dominant paradigm.

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Tomorrow is the first day of my exciting new adventure, a three month artist residency at the Iramoo Community Centre in Wyndham Vale.  For those of you not terribly familiar with Wyndham Vale it’s right next to Werribee on Melbourne’s South-Western most border.  In fact the community centre looks right out over some classic western basalt plains.

It’s an interesting little suburb.  Some parts old and some parts new, both in houses and in people.  It’s a quiet wee spot but has a really interesting and engaged little community.  It’s very much like my suburb.  One of those spots surrounded in busy bustlingness so often gets overlooked and as a result has a little village feel.

For my residency I’m going to be based in the local environment centre which is tucked away in a quiet street overlooking the delightfully tranquil Lollipop Creek.  I’m going to be up to all sorts of lovely mischief involving different groups within the community and using all sorts of materials from local natural materials through to industrial offcuts from local businesses.  And whatever else I stumble across along the way.

Alongside the environment centre is a giant heavily laden apple tree.  So to kick start the residency I’m going to host a apple sauce making day with locals and anyone else interested in coming.  Details about that soon.

In the meantime, I’d love to ear if any of my readers are out that way.  Or if you know anyone who lives nearby who’d be interested in some craft workshops or just plain ol play time, please pass this on.  I’ll be sending out email newsletters about this project so if you want to be on it, drop me a line.

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Rayna Fahey took up craft to ease the boredom of being confined to the house during a difficult pregnancy five years ago. Cross stitch was the most tedious activity she could think of to get her through nine long months. A political activist, Rayna had recently finished three years working for the New Zealand Parliament, which meant “it was never going to be long before the stitches got radical.”  Using her existing website Rayna added a page for her radical cross stitch work, and very soon visits to the page sky-rocketed, demonstrating “there was clearly an audience for craft with a message.”

Rayna saw an opportunity to inject some radicalism into crafting circles, as well as to communicate revolutionary ideas to new audiences, and Radical Cross Stitch was born. Defined as radical due to the materials used or the message conveyed, traditional perceptions of craft are challenged, and many contemporary artists are now pushing the boundaries using the varied form.

Rayna’s craft mainly takes two forms: Traditional framed cross stitch embroidery with a radical political message, or outdoor pieces which make use of the environment such as weaving cross stitch into chain link fences. These outdoor pieces make “political statements specifically about the space they’re in.” As an elder once said to Rayna “if you’re going to talk about the environment talk about it IN the environment.”

In 2008 Rayna coordinated a “loose-knit band of revolutionaries” known as the ‘Melbourne Revolutionary Craft Circle’ to create a piece on a fence around a vacant corner block in Footscray. “I WANNA LIVE HERE” was cross-stitched into the fence as a response to the issue of housing affordability and lack of land supply when here was an example of the under-utilised land around the city. This work was made into a short film and featured in a full length documentary as well as appearing in various publications around the world.

In the coming weeks Rayna will commence a three-month artist residency at the Imaroo Community Centre in Wyndham Vale. Working with the various groups that use the centre to create local outdoor installations, Rayna will also be creating a major new piece of her own. Excited to get started, Rayna is the first artist in residence at the centre, which is located in an area “not normally associated with a thriving arts scene”. Her main mission will be to take her radical craft to the streets, and also to produce some ‘how-to’ guides whilst in residency, so others can get radical with their craft long after she has left her mark.

“My work really tries to get people thinking about the issues of land rights, homelessness, urban planning, sustainability and public/private divides…I try to use my outdoor craft to stimulate debate and thought.” Rayna explains. “What’s been most inspiring for me is discovering after an installation how many people in the community are passionate about similar issues…Who needs the press when you’ve got radical craft?”

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But there’s some stuff you can’t sell too easily. And I’ve managed to filter a whole big bag of old knickers socks and bras out of the drawer (which I can now close! hurrah!). Rather than biff them in the bin, since textile production is one of the most wasteful industries on the planet, I’ve been seeking out ideas for reusing.

I’ve also set myself a wee mission this year to see how many different ways I can come up with the grow plants on fences. Long time readers will know I’m not the worlds biggest fence fan. But while it’s not possible to completely do away with them, I’m interested in finding ways to make the ones we have to have more functional. Canvases and gardens have been my two areas of experimentation.

So with that in mind I had a cheeky yet cunning idea to reuse my old bras. I’ve recently finished breastfeeding and I’m certainly not planning on doing that again so I’ve got a heap of maternity bras. They’re pretty solid so I thought they might make awesome plant pots!

PRESENTING: Possibly the worlds first Bra Bug fence pot tutorial!!

Materials:
old bras
scissors
needle and thread
stuff to decorate with (buttons, glitter, embroidery thread etc)
dirt
sand
little plants – succulent cuttings are ideal

STEP ONE

Grab a big pile of bras

STEP TWO

Cut off the back strap and shoulder straps

STEP THREE

Decorate!! There is absolutely no instruction here. Go nuts. Make your bras whatever you can possibly imagine them to be.  I made bugs because these were heading for the fence at our community garden where our Permaculture Playgroup is held.  Each week we have a theme and bugs was it this week.

Don’t laugh at my dorky bugs!

STEP FOUR

Fence time! This is of course the most fun bit. Find yourself a chain link fence and slip one half of the bra through and fold it back on itself so the two cups are joined.  Then stitch along the side and the bottom so it holds together.  You can stitch however you like just try not to leave gaps or the dirt will just fall through.

TIP 1: Use a fat long needle.  It’s quite tricky pushing the needle through since the fabric is usually quite thick.  Especially if you have a padded bra.

TIP 2: Get a friend to help with this bit and have a person on each side.  It’s a wee bit tricky to push the needle through from the opposite side of the fence you’re standing on.  It’s possible but annoying.  Also, it’s more fun making stuff with friends

STEP FIVE:

Gardening time!  Fill your bug up with dirt and then plant.  I was planting succulents and put 3/4 dirt and 1/4 sand so it looked pretty.

TIP: when you’re putting in the first bit of dirt make sure you stuff it in to fill the cups out, especially if you aren’t using padded bras.  It’ll help it hold its shape.

And that’s it!

These ones were very much an experiment and I am quite sure I will perfect the art of upcycling old bras into spectacular mini fence gardens and I’ll try and update this post with any great lessons learned.  In the meantime, have a go! I for one think the world is finally ready for the next great thing in organic, sustainable street art.

xox

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And the award for the most fun sounding craftivist project of the year award goes to…

To celebrate the 70th birthday of John Lennon, the Craftivist Collective, a bunch of rad types over in England have organised a brilliant creative venture to get you thinking and talking about what global peace and justice means and would actually look like. Participants have been invited to create an embroidered quilt piece which will become part of a giant peace protest duvet. Radical and cosy, doesn’t get much better.

World peace sometimes sounds a bit cliché. In these days of greater global awareness and communication about the worlds ills, sometimes I reckon we make things just a bit too complicated and get a bit niche in our focus on issues. I know it certainly helps me in my activism to stop and take a breather every now and then and remember the big picture. Certainly thinking about vision and imagining how we want the world to be, rather than just focussing on what’s wrong with it is a very useful process to help avoid the ol’ activist burnout.

You can check out all the details here and sign up here to get involved.

Sadly, I’m going to have to give this one a miss. One of my best ways to keep me focussed and motivated on making the world a better place is hanging out with my kids. The last few months have been pretty madcap and I’m quickly realising my babies aren’t going to be babies much longer. So I’m downing tools project-wise for a couple of months to hang out in the sun in the garden.

But you have no excuse, get stitching.

peace

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When I first moved to Australia, Sydney was my first stop. I have an aunty there who’s always been a great friend and at the time some old buddies were based there. I wasn’t there long but it sure was a crazy time. And while Sydney is probably not the kind of place I would chose to live in, it’s definitely a place I like to visit.

Sydney always invokes memories of sunny days, tropical storms, plenty of trees and fabulous bird life. It’s definitely one of those big cities that is so diverse geographically that it’s not hard to find a spot where you feel like you’re in a small town.

So I was pretty excited when Casey and I were contacted early in the year to see if we’d bring some work up for an exhibition. It’s been a long time coming, but it’s finally here!

This Saturday Object Gallery is opening We Craft This City. The Craft Cartel will be there displaying our stockpile of knitted ammunition for the Stop the Pulp Mill campaign. We’ll also be holding a workshop so you can join in and make your own. No experience necessary of course!

We’ll also have some work on the wall. Casey has a couple of pieces in the show and I’m showing three of my larger pieces, including a brand new one, and a series of small pieces.  I’ll do a full write up with pictures after the opening.

Also in the show and holding workshops are the awesome Ebony Bizys and Knitty Gritty and Loopy.

And then! On Saturday night is a screening of Making it Handmade in Annandale. There’s not many tickets left so if you want to come you should get yours quick smart! After the screening, there’ll be a short Q&A with the Director, Anna and Casey and I. Do hope you can make it to see this awesomely inspiring film.

xox
Rayna

p.s. apologies on the lack of blogging recently. If you haven’t heard, we were broken into and had our laptops stolen. I’m still waiting on our insurance company to replace them! In the meantime I’m using a dreadfully slow computer that HATES the internet. It’s hard I tells ya.. Normal sporadic service should resume shortly (I hope).

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