The Textile Reader

Description

The Textile Reader is the first anthology to address textiles as a distinctive area of cultural practice and a developing field of scholarly research. Revealing the full diversity of approaches to the study of textiles, The Textile Reader introduces students to the theoretical frameworks essential to the exploration of the textile from both a critical and a creative perspective. Content is drawn from a wide range of genres - blogs, artists' statements and fiction, as well as critical writings - and organized in themed sections covering touch, memory, structure, politics, production and use. The content of each thematic section is separately introduced and concludes with a bibliography for further reading. The Textile Reader is an invaluable resource for students of textile design, textile art, applied arts and crafts and material culture. Selected authors include Anni Albers; Gilles Deleuze; Felix Guattari; Sarat Maharaj; Rozsika Parker; Sadie Plant; Peter Stallybrass; Alice Walker; and Catherine de Zegher.

Jessica Hemmings is Professor of Crafts and Vice-Prefekt of Research, HDK - Academy of Design and Crafts, University of Gothenburg, Sweden. Jessica is editor of In the Loop: Knitting Now (2010) and Cultural Threads: Transnational Textiles Today (Bloomsbury, 2014), and author of Warp and Weft: Woven Textiles in Fashion, Art and Interiors (Bloomsbury, 2012). She is a regular contributor of articles and reviews to publications including Crafts, Selvedge, and the Surface Design Journal.

This Reader is not merely a collection, but more of an interrogation that speaks from the past to the future . . . With this in mind, The Textile Reader is not a 'page turner', but a constant companion, a new friend that has been there and done that, and thus offers the reader a platform from which to consider and develop the future of the discipline. -- Jo Turney, Bath Spa University * Textile History * [T]he pieces are well chosen: they read as though they were selected because someone likes them and finds them interesting, and this gives the selection personality and integrity ... Its greatest value is, however, in its general sense of opening out the genres and the way in which it creates a space for different types of writing on textiles to be considered on an equal footing. -- Eleanor Flegg, University of Ulster, UK * The Journal of Modern Craft 7:3 * This is a book that will undoubtedly become a key resource for all those interested in considering the location of textile practice, but also for those who seek to understand and challenge textile practice's perceived inferiority as a mode of practice. * Embroidery Magazine, November 2012 * This is an ideal foundational text to give an overview of the broad field of Textile Research. It allows students access to a range of themes and key authors in the field which can then be researched in more depth. * Dr Fiona Curran, Royal College of Art, UK *