Anni Albers wrote that “Beginnings are usually more interesting than elaborations and endings.” How did you get started in weaving? 

I became obsessed with weaving while I was at art school in Melbourne, at Victorian College of the Arts in 2015. I began by weaving on a loom I made, a very simple mechanism of a big vertical frame for the warp to be wrapped around. The style of weaving was more like building a picture. In third year, I acquired my first floor loom which changed the way I create weavings: quicker, finer and more complex weaving patterns. Later on in the year, Summer of 2018, I spent time in Ecuador where I learnt how to weave on a backstrap loom, as well as spinning and dyeing yarns. Growing up in Aotearoa, weaving is very important in our material culture, which had an impact on me. 

I wonder if the meaning behind this quote from Albers regards the process of weaving in itself … she goes on to say, “Beginning means exploration, selection, development, a potent vitality not yet limited, not circumscribed by the tried and traditional.”[1]

The pre-planning and preparation on the loom is the most important part of the weaving process. Weaving is set in the foundations—creating the code for the warp, the sequence of heddle code for the pattern, the space between the warp threads, the ply used and the width and length of the weaving, perfect tension … Once this is set there is little to no chance to change. The actual weaving part is really quite simple and straightforward. 

Weaving seems particularly well placed for thinking about structure, about the unit’s (the thread) relationship to the whole (the design). In your work, this is applied conceptually, too: you gesture to the patterns that organise a daily routine or an urban environment. Where do you look for the ‘units’ of a city or a day?

Weavings are immersive webs and structural networks that exchange information on their substrate. Unlike most modes of making, weaving has a surface which is its structure and its structure is its surface, and any patterns embedded in its substrate are still organically part of its surface structure. There’s a concern for form and topology inherent in weaving. 

I apply this logic to the urban environment which is muse for a work or body of work. The muse can be either historically or architecturally important or interesting. For instance in 2018, I based a year’s worth of work on 120 Collins Street. The building looks like a tapestry. 

My practice is an extrapolation of the location, generated into a code for the sequence of threads. The painted element focuses on design or architectural elements from the muse, and are applied in a smooth and geometric manner. These two elements emphasise the structure of the urban location, yet create a whole, new, abstracted image. 

The emphasis on structure in weaving is partly down to the importance of utility; most textiles are intended for everyday use. How does working in a fine art context, where utility is perhaps a secondary consideration, enable you to test the principles of construction and design? 

My work, in a sense, is expanded painting. I think the act of stretching a textile around bars and priming it fixes it into being as a classical art object.

I have made fabrics that function within the realm of utility. Last year I collaborated with Chinese, Melbourne based fashion designer Wackie Ju at Australian Fashion Week. I contributed the raw weaving for two garments in their collection ‘Summer Fade’. Additionally, I did a collaboration of a seat and light piece with furniture designer Bridget Owers-Buccianti of Realnonreal and ceramicist Claudia Lau. For this, my weaving was the upholstery for a bench seat. I had to consider the structure of the weaving, to be strong and durable to be sat on or to be worn, and to be manipulated into a cushion and garment by the designers.