Memorial Handkerchiefs, 2001 - 2004
Artist's explanation:
The names were originally printed on handkerchiefs in 2001.
Technically, they were printed in permanent paint through the stencilled oil boards (4 names per card). I want to thank artist Alice Dubiel for the use of her studio, Seattle. Thank you to Stan Gielewski. A 'wave' of bronze/ gold paint was added to 'ease the eye'. This was not the technique of a needleworker, I have always approached the memorial as a sculptor.
In 2004, after beginning my doctorate research in text annd textiles, I decided to embroider the names white-on-white because of my research on remembering and re-recording (memory and erasure) and needlework. My aunt kindly agreed to start this for me, as she had almost lost her father and brother to The Troubles.
The 2004 unveiling of the memorial contained 25 embroidered handkerchiefs or 250 names embroidered. Then, an elderly friend came forward, Edith Morriot (see photo) and was moved to tears upon hearing about the project. She tatted 3 hankies and wove in a lock of her red hair.
In late 2004, after further research, I decided to 'mark' each of the hankies with a spot of hair; this is still in process. The latter references Victorian mourning jewellery (death was more typical in that era due to infant mortality and the American civil war) and 'memento mori'; yet something crafted with a loved one's hair was / is also considered 'a love token'.
Any spot on linen, alternatively /additionally, represents violence (profanity) marking something sacred (the skin / the body / white eccesiastical linen). I also consider the spots on the linen to be akin to the 'iconic' freckles on the fair skin of someone considered to be 'typically Irish / Irish - British' (The latter is now up for debate in academic dialogue / academic art criticism in studies about 'Whiteness' as there is a 'new' intercultural identity of contemporary Ireland/Northern Ireland!).
The embroidery continues today ....there are about 1000 names still awaiting commemoration by hand...
Thank you to the labour of all the embroiderers, without whom this monument would not continue to be 'built'...
