Reading, watching and listening tips

During the preparations for the exhibition D(R)AAD. About embroidery as protest and healing our guest curator Kim Knopers was inspired by a large number of books, videos, interviews and visits to other exhibitions. Here is a selection to read further and discover more about embroidery as protest and healing.

Threads of life. A world history through the eye of a needle by Claire Hunter is a compelling book about women and men who, throughout the centuries and on different continents, have used the language of needle and thread to make their voices heard, even in the most difficult circumstances. For sale in the museum shop. Read an article by Claire Hunter here https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2019/feb/23/the-calming-effects-of-sewing-can-help-people-express-and-calm-themselves

Find more historical Tatreez patterns on the blog of TRC in Leiden (lenders of the historic Tatreez embroidery from Palestine). https://www.trc-leiden.nl/trc/index.php/nl/textiel-momenten/998-some-palestinian-embroidery-charts-for-easter

The colleagues from the Dolhuys, also in Haarlem, have a beautiful and poignant embroidered asylum coat in their permanent presentation. One of the patients in Duin en Bosch did not want to undergo the gray mass and gave her coat her own personal touch. She embroidered the inside of her coat with colorful, imaginative motifs.

https://museumvandegeest.nl/kunstwerken/geborduurde-gestichtsjas/

Originally published in 1984, the feminist, scientific book provided The Subversive Stitch, embroidery and the making of the feminine by Rozsika Parker upon its release for a renewed attention to embroidery and how it was brought from the private world of female domesticity into the visual arts and used to question gender roles. Very accessibly written.

Wire is a beautiful biography plus by the English writer Julia Blackburn about the English fisherman John Craske who becomes seriously ill and from that moment on his longing for the sea is expressed in embroidery. Read an excerpt here: https://www.athenaeum.nl/leesfragmenten/2016/draad

Watch this beautiful documentary about the embroideries of artist Britta Marakatt-Labba that tell the story of the Northern European nomadic Sami people. An excellent example of embroidery as a powerful protest. https://npo.nl/start/serie/close-up/seizoen-17/close-up-kunstenares-britta-marakatt-en-de-nomaden-van-de-finse-poolcirkel_1/afspelen