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3rd May – 29th June
Howgill Gallery, Farfield Mill Arts & Heritage Centre, Sedbergh. LA10 5LW
[b]MECHANICAL DRAWING – THE SCHIFFLI PROJECT[/b]
A touring exhibition originated by the School of Design, Manchester Metropolitan University

Featuring: Rowena Ardern, Jill Boyes, Nigel Cheney, Isabel Dibden Wright, Stephen Dixon, Nina Edge, Kate Egan, Rozanne Hawksley, Alice Kettle, Jane McKeating, Melanie Miller, Susan Platt, Sally Morfill, Lynn Setterington, and Alison Welsh.

The Schiffli Project documents and explores textile practice and the creative process through the responses of a range of practitioners to the UK’s last working Schiffli machine.
What is the MMU Schiffli machine? It is a unique, one-hundred year old multi-needle embroidery machine capable of mechanically stitching repeat patterns or images across a two-metre wide piece of cloth. The stitched designs are created by moving a pantograph by hand. Such machines were traditionally used to mass-produce commercial embroidery. This exhibition brings together some of the leading contemporary textile artists today and each has approached the machine in a very individual way, bringing something of their own practice to the machine and challenging the usual pre-conceptions of commercial embroidery.