Signs in Textile
by Lisbeth Tolstrup

Published 1995 in: Textil Set (Textile Seen), exhibition catalogue, Herning Art Museum.

Textile art often finds itself struggling to get rid of its congeniality - the fact that very few can read more than a few layers in the work. This congeniality is closely related to a manual language that comes from the craft and a technical language whose source is unique pieces - or industrial production - and thus the actual process of working textile fibers, thread, and surfaces of cloth into an artistic expression. There is no tradition of a descriptive language - neither do we find terms in the history of art nor descriptions of tapestries from certain specific periods - which is why efforts to grasp the art of textiles easily drowns in terminologies of the craft or pure technicality.

Most difficult are the opposites indifference and dangerousness. The opening came with a bang during the years after World War II. Practical needlework lost significance as new methods of production gave way to new materials and techniques. Classicals tapestries found themselves crowded by searching experiments that in American terminology were dubbed fiber art - and which soon found its own place here in areas like paper, sculpture and land art. The boundaries towards the traditional tapestries became ever more fluid, while the movement in the opposite direction is still sluggish - if not non-existent.

More than 30 years have now passed since the Biennial of Textile Art in Lausanne announced a textile revolution at the beginning of the 60s, and the Nordic Textile Triennial defied Rome in a series of forceful and widely discussed exhibitions. The flourish seemed strong and necessary. But strong as it was the rest of the field has stood equally weak during the last decade. A general slackness has spread, whether it was in tapestry or in the free textile area. The number of textile exhibitions has been negligibly low, and only a few, relatively big names had enough to do.

The situation is now different. It seems that in their feverish search for novelty both the biennial and the triennial have overlooked the most important raw material, namely the textile artists.

Neither of the two any longer function as jural exhibitions that are evaluated on an international scale - but what's perhaps even worse is that the nordic exhibition has lost its most characteristic trait, namely its ties to the growth layer of professionals in nordic textile art.

Seen on this background of despondency it is worth noting the number of initiatives which are now showing up on the textile scene. It is happening on all levels, from the small supportive groups to ambitions of seeing textiles mark Denmark's international profile and vice versa. In this light the work that went into the exhibition Textile Seen stands as a strong sign of a movement which is also about to materialize in countries like France, Poland, Russia, and several German states. Textile artists meet at international symposiums here and abroad, exhibitions are being held, and new constellations created that respect both the archeforms and the experiments. New layers are being created with respect for an area which, during its several thousand years of history, has shown itself capable of rising again like a Phoenix, recognizable and yet changeable.

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