All wrapped up

from Sheila Paine's collection

I am following with interest Kathleen Loomis (Art with a needle)'s Package Project posts. Above is an example of a set of packages from Kathleen's blog. And as is so often the case, when you see one example, suddenly there are three.
I first encountered the deliberate wrapping of what might otherwise be called detritus many years ago when I was on an Embroiderers' Guild workshop on using unusual materials. It was taught by Clyde Olliver. Another participant was Gwen Hedley who had brought her beachcombings along. They can be seen beautifully couched, above.
Both Loomis and Hedley seek out their packaged material and are making something out of seemingly 'nothing'. Hedley especially is thoughtfully deliberate, and has been working on this aspect of her work for some years.

I recently encountered another manifestation of such a gathering up: this time by Laura Potter in the exhibition Memoranda at the Crafts Study Centre in Farnham. Memoranda is an exhibition of the work of four artists, inspired by objects in the CSC collection.

Laura Potter chose a shoebox full of Lucie Rie's archived small test-glazed pots, and from this she was inspired to create An incomplete archive of unfinished ideas, a small part of which can be seen in the photo above.

She says: For various reasons, these ideas have stopped, or rather I have stopped working on them. They all present me with problems of one sort or another, but because they are still hanging around it is difficult to stop thinking about them. But there are a lot of other things to think about right now, and these ideas are just taking up valuable head-space. I'm going to 'finish' them all, by putting them all in neat little boxes with numbers and labels so they can be archived and forgotten: not for negative, but for positive reasons. (I have edited this slightly.)
It's a lovely idea that the seemingly worthless, discarded, lost, and unsuccessful objects around us can be gathered to create something meaningful beyond a comment on our over-consumption. I like the idea that these repurposings are manifestations of our culture just like the Afghan gun cosy at the top of this post.

The Memoranda exhibition is well worth seeing. It is difficult to sum up in a post to do it justice - and I also found the accompanying book containing essays and interviews with the artists most illuminating.