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Big Fibre Little Fibre


Big Fibre Little Fibre quashes the idea that fibre art is always tiny and delicate. This year it's colossal, it's unrestrained and there's even a horse constructed of foam and 1.4 million individually knotted hairs.

It was all motivated by a "Gee, it's so big!" at last years show. So this year the curators decided to take on the concept of size in the 2nd Annual Juried Textile Exhibition at the Gladstone Hotel. The show is all about what is big and what is small.

In the small things being big category, there are a two pieces of note. The life-sized horse, that resembles the infamous Snuffleupagus (minus the trunk), by artist Keith Bentley. It isn't soft and snuggly though, it's made from horse hair collected from slaughter houses and Bentley meticulously knotted each piece to the foam frame! And then there's the special installation by Emily Hermant, a giant thumbprint pinned to the wall of room 214 to provoke thoughts of the anonymous women in the textile industry. I was thinking more about her thumbs, the print is made up of 65, 000 steel dressmaker pins.

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Small things that are outright fantastic are Amanda McCavour's delicately threaded 'Hands' pulling themselves apart and the oxymoronic 'Gun Cozies' crafted from vintage aprons and ribbon by Miriam Grenville.

There's also burlap webbing and geometric strings covering ceilings and walls, fifteen fucks and whole lot more.

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And when you're all done exploring, there's even a little shopping. Texti'll has soft and warm reclaimed wool mittens and scarves for sale, just in time for winter, (its coming you know).

Exhibition runs Friday October 12 to November 25, 12-5pm Daily | 3rd and 4th Floors.

Special installations run: October 12 - 14, 12-5pm Daily | 2nd Floor .

The Gladstone Hotel, 1214 Queen St. West.

Photos by Richelle Forsey.


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