Les Bicknell l.bicknell@nua.ac.uk Norwich
University of the Arts
smocking, folding, classification, archives, practice
Abstract
smocking is evil? was created and
employed as a framework, a creative thinking space to enable reflection on the
concept of folded space within objects held in three archives. The project’s
focus was to explore practically and theoretically how the physical engagement
with objects can both inform and reinforce a relationship to the territory of
bookmaking, whilst enlightening and extending an art practice to include a
range of traditional textile skills. Working in partnership with The Museum of
East Anglian Life (MEAL) Suffolk, Costume and Textile Study Centre Norwich,
Suffolk County Council Archives with support from Arts Council England and
Norwich University of the Arts (NUA).
The project developed from an idea initiated
from observing a painting by the Italian Renaissance artist Vittore Carpaccio,
culminating with a body of work exhibited in three archives alongside objects
from the collections that had informed the making of the new pieces. Areas
covered include; the journey of the project, entry points for researching archives,
identifying the correct research path to follow, the idea of taxonomy as a tool
for understanding, and how the physical properties of material can be theorised
to support the creation of meaningful work.
Conclusions include moments of
revelation on my own practice, how textual theory, physical handling and
practical making can inform each other and the implications of the lessons
learnt for a teaching practice.
‘The act of archiving introduces meaning, order, boundaries, coherence
and reason into what is disparate and confused, contingent and without contours’.
Alphen (2008).
This paper will examine the creative process behind an arts research
project from the initial idea developed from observing a painting by the Italian
Renaissance artist Vittore Carpaccio to new work exhibited in three archives
alongside objects from the collections.
The project’s title ‘smocking is evil?’ was used as a tool to develop a
body of work. It became a framework that supported the development of a
paradigm, a world within which a maker can inhabit; to think and make. This
space becomes a place of sanctuary, a refuge where ideas are projected and
envisaged. But its liminal walls offer a permeable playground for the
imagination, where ideas can be developed and tested within their own
parameters but informed by the research undertaken in the field, a place where
tentative thoughts are translated into questions.
The idea of creating a virtual space to inhabit has its parallels in the
use of the mnemonic device, a learning technique that aids information
retention as outlined in The Art of Memory.
‘The first step was to imprint on the memory a
series of loci or places. The commonest, though not the only, type of mnemonic
place system used was the architectural type. The clearest description of the
process is that given by Quintilian. In order to form a series of places in
memory, he says, a building is to be remembered, as spacious and varied a one
as possible, the forecourt, the living room, bedrooms, and parlours, not
omitting statues and other ornaments with which the rooms are decorated. Quintilian
says one may consider the ideas within the speech to be remembered anchored in
imagination on the places which have been memorised in the building. This done,
as soon as the memory of the facts requires to be revived, these places are
visited in turn and the various deposits demanded of their custodians revealed.
We have to think of the ancient orator as moving in imagination through his
memory building whilst he is making his speech, drawing from the memorised
places the images he has placed on them.’ Yates (1966)
The question is smocking evil? was developed from an encounter in the
Gallerie dell'Accademia in Venice with the painting ‘The Ambassadors
Return to the English Court’ a ‘history painting’ by the Italian Renaissance
artist Vittore Carpaccio. The work portrays the ambassadors of Brittany being
received in an open pavilion. The initial point of research came from studying
a figure in the foreground of this painting that was facing the Ambassador thus
displaying his back to the viewer. He wears a garment heavily folded and is
holding a note behind his back, hidden from the Ambassadors from Brittany. (Figure
1: Vittore Carpaccio The Ambassadors Return to the English Court)
A connection was surmised between the possible character trait of the
individual and the wearing of a cloth that is structured. This initial idea of
associating garment and cloth construction with character traits was supported
by a rush of known connections.
Deleuzeian thought on the idea of the hidden and of revelation through
the process of creating folds informs us that to pleat is to reduce, to
diminish, and to withdraw. Unfolding is to increase, to grow to gain volume. A
dialogue is set up between the inside and outside, dark and the light, the
negative and the positive but nothing is fixed, the work appears to be in a
constant flow from the outside to the inside and back again. Deleuze (1993).
Textiles have functioned within the venn diagram of artistic, economic
and political activity and the idea of researching the busy hands that created
the smocking on the smock resonated, was this subjugation through craft?
Fry defines the traditional textile technique of smocking as an
embroidery technique undertaken by gathering and fixing cloth in regularly
spaced tucks which provides flexibility and form within a garment. The word
smock, derived from a farmer’s work shirt is a modern spelling of an Old English
word ‘smocc’ a verb meaning to gather fabric into un-pressed pleats by sewing
in a honeycomb pattern. Fry (1946) eventually the word was used to refer to
both the sewing technique and the garments it produced.
The conflation or mash-up of these thoughts presented possible developments
or new perspectives on what appeared to be well rehearsed topics.
When attempting to establish our understanding of the smock, its
narrative, it became important to understand the potential of the smock as a
symbol. The Museum of East Anglian Life in Stowmarket has a smock given by a
local amateur dramatics society after it had been used as a prop/costume within
their productions. (Figure 2: photograph of a smock from Museum of East Anglian
Life STMEA:20137)
It was used as a visual shortcut, a cipher to signal and label an
individual who is deemed to be rural and therefore foolish. This was supported
by the textual narrative that came with the object and the physical evidence of
theatrical 'make up' around the collar.
On the 13th June 1851 the London Times reported on the visit to the
great exhibition by over 800 agricultural labourers and country folk wearing
their smartest smock-frocks. The commentaries tone implied that the rustics
were seen as other and unlike anything that could have been produced from any
part of England, although they behaved themselves to the satisfaction of the
organisers who had expected vandalism from these strangers. This report
demonstrates the separation of town and country and the wearing of the smock
being a marker of that difference. Marshall (1980) (Figure 3: Image from The
London Times 13th June 1851)
The demise of the smock as a marker corresponds with and is an indicator
of the Industrial Revolution. The loose garment became impractical and
dangerous to wear in the newly mechanised fields cluttered with machinery with
its moving parts. The wearing of the smock was abandoned as it brought with it
a fear of ridicule for the wearers as individuals moved from rural to urban
locations.
This practical garment for agricultural labourers later became a symbol
of earthiness worn by bohemian crafts people of the Aesthetic movement. Adopted
by the friends of Oscar Wilde and William Morris who himself promoted the smock
as a protest against the man-made of the machine age. Morris was taken to the
Great Exhibition by his mother but refused to enter on the grounds that he
would find nothing but ‘meretricious rubbish’. Marshall (1980) (Figure 4: Image
of William Morris from Marshall, Beverly. 1980. Smocks and Smocking. Van
Nostrand Rheinhold)
The intention of the research project was to explore the fold within objects
in three collections and this would inform the making of a body of new work.
This work was in turn to be exhibited and the practical aspects, the making,
the development of skills were to be disseminated through a number of workshops
and illustrated talks. But an entry point was needed to begin to access the
collections.
head gear – hats and scarves – overalls – lots of pockets – trousers –
construction of clothes – over clothes – garments that protect the clothes – boots
– with connecting/joining elements – packets – paper/plastic – folded or
constructed that contained things (seeds) (food), images (photographs) of
farmers – rural workers /amateur dramatics – bellows – accordions – leather
work – saddles – objects that fold out (get larger) (telescopic) – objects that
are fixed in an obvious way (patched and folded) – printed matter – books –
manuals – catalogues – swatches – display packs (with folded structures) (fold
outs – additions – binding) (use of unusual materials).
This chaotic initial list of initial interests sent to The Museum of
East Anglian Life is reminiscent of the taxonomical list used by The
Argentinean author Jose Luis Borges when illustrating the problematic nature of
scientific classification when he described a classification system in a 1942
essay The Analytical Language of John Wilkins from an ancient Chinese
Encyclopaedia, the Celestial Emporium of Benevolent Knowledge.
‘animals are divided into: those that belong to the
Emperor, embalmed ones, those that are trained, suckling pigs, stray dogs,
those that tremble as if they were mad, those that are included in this
classification, Mermaids, those drawn with a very fine camel's hair brush,
innumerable ones, fabulous ones, others, those that have just broken the flower
vase and those that at a distance resemble flies’. Borges (1942)
With all early stages of a project every thought has the potential to be
a starting point for a thread of research. To retain an open dialogue the
thread would not be Arianne’s Hernu (2013) due to its all encompassing
deductive methodology. The time scale of the project alongside the sheer scope
and numbers of objects held within the collections and archives meant that
trial-and-error would provide a more efficient strategy to determine the
choices needed when deciding on what to view. A heuristic process was adopted.
It was this intuitive process which led the focus of the project from smocking
to encompass layering and pleating.
The project included a search for appropriate classification taxonomy to
both understand the work created post-rationally through reflection and also
enable and support the development of work, reflection in action. The numerous
strands of research developed connections; which led through the collections
and created a range of categories which included smocking, folding, joining, fixing,
and fixings. An idea subconsciously informed by considering Serra’s verb list
of 1967. Friedman (2013). Eventually I recognised that the objects I was drawn
to inhabited a similar set of factors. They each contained an element of
layering which meant that a part of the object was hidden, thus they required
manipulation to reveal all their parts.
The process of categorization in which ideas and objects are recognised,
differentiated, and understood, is a tool to lead and direct research activity,
enabling connections to be uncovered that are not initially obvious to either
the seasoned archive user or the novice. Categorization implies that objects
are grouped into categories with a collective purpose. This perceived purpose
is not always one which is shared by the searcher of the collection and the
developer of the criteria which formed the categories. Ideally, a category
illuminates a particular relationship between subjects or objects of knowledge.
Artists often follow a course of lateral thinking, connecting seemingly
unconnected aspects of objects or subjects to create artworks , the viewing and
theorising of which presents new perspectives or in some instances a paradigm
shift, see the work of Duchamp (1989).
There are many categorization theories and techniques that can be used
to support investigation, the potential rules of engagement, acting as a
jumping off point. providing pathways or boundaries for developing decisions
about choice and provide direction around investigative structures.
When does a bend become a fold?
The practical aspects of categorisation have their own inherent flaws
when considering the individual narratives of each object. How can the
description on the label attached to the object encompass the context of each
viewing? To be able to truly distinguish one object from another, to acknowledge
their inherent differences each object would have to have a unique set of
labels or tags to be able to distinguish it from any other object. Eventually there
would be so many categories and sub-divisions of categories that there would be,
in effect an extensive textural copy of the object, creating an immense pre-linnaeu
world of polynomical phrases. The acknowledgment that objects are accessed through
textual descriptions sometimes delivers a lack of trust in the objects
themselves. This reminded me of On Exactitude in Science, the Borges short
story.
‘In that empire, the craft of cartography attained
such perfection that the map of a single province covered the space of an
entire city and the map of the empire itself an entire province. In the course
of time, these extensive maps were found somehow wanting, and so the College of
Cartographers evolved a map of the empire that was of the same scale as the
empire and that coincided with it point for point. The following generations,
less attentive to the study of cartography, came to judge a map of such
magnitude cumbersome and quite useless and it was abandoned to the rigours of
sun and rain. In the western deserts, tattered fragments of the map are still
to be found sheltering an occasional beast or beggar; in all the land, no other
relic is left of the discipline of geography’. Borges (1942)
Typology in its oldest set of meanings derives from a critical
explanation or interpretation of the Biblical, where a person, event, or thing
in the Old Testament is seen to prefigure a type of person, event, or thing in
the New Testament. This sense of the old providing a clue to the forms of new
things is a way to consider how Pitt Rivers thought about typology. Rivers
popularized a concept that had become central to the work of natural sciences.
His interest in Evolution and connection to Darwin is evident. The idea of the
evolution of objects as portrayed in Plate III, On the Evolution of Culture,
1875. It illustrates a process of visual connectedness that identifies
potential next steps. The process of deduction is primarily visual and
therefore provides a readymade and familiar way of proceeding for the visual
artist. (Figure 5: Image of Plate III, Drawings of clubs, boomerangs, shields
and spears moving from simple forms to complex in a radiating pattern from Pitt-Rivers
(1875). On the Evolution of Culture Rethinking Pitt-Rivers Pitt-Rivers
Publications Plates)
Rethinking categorisation can be used as an alternative way of accessing
collections and archives, making one's own links between objects as a
methodology to redirect or relocate a projects research reference points into
unfamiliar territory. Instead of considering items thematically, we might
perhaps catalogue them according to the frequency with which they were used. So
perhaps the appointment diary an artist always kept in a jacket pocket would
belong to one series and the official award certificate they barely looked at
would belong to another. McNally (2013). Although in a conventional archive
catalogue, both these items would come under the heading 'personal items'.
Every object has an infinite number of stories attached to it and each
personal truth illustrates multiple connections. This accumulation of knowledge
maps our relationship to what and how we value the objects around us. How we
catalogue the items within collections has its own history. The move from
science based hierarchical thinking around the construction and reading of
collections towards a more individual contextual understanding appears to have
coincided with the breaking down of social barriers and the rise of valuing the
individual in society. Fonda (1966)
The reference point for engaging with an object has the potential to
change with the intention behind each individual viewing. Every object in each
collection has many narratives; each one delivers the viewer new contexts and
presents new possible functions. It could be argued that an object’s
functionality is something that is constructed in the mind through collective
use and understanding. If the functionality of an object can change in the mind
each action or activity, changes our perception of and relationship to the
object. (Figure 6: image of filing cabinet at the Museum of East Anglian Life).
Does this in some way physically change the object? Is it possible to
actually alter an object by rethinking it? This connects to ideas around
transubstantiation, the perceived transformation that takes place during the
sacrament of Holy Communion. The act of partaking in consuming the body and
blood of Christ through eating a wafer and drinking wine. This idea of belief
as a transformative process has its parallels in the art world, specifically
Oak tree a work by Michael Craig Martin.
‘I considered that in An Oak Tree I had
deconstructed the work of art in such a way as to reveal its single basic and
essential element, belief that is the confident faith of the artist in his
capacity to speak and the willing faith of the viewer in accepting what he has
to say. In other words belief underlies our whole experience of art: it
accounts for why some people are artists and others are not, why some people
dismiss works of art others highly praise, and why something we know to be
great does not always move us’. Craig-Martin (2001)
When physically spending time in the presence of the objects in the
collections meaningful links flow, reflection through interaction becomes a
form of meditated conversation. I am in sympathy with the statement ‘I love
things, I love stuff, I love the stories that we tell through material culture’.
Dion / Warholian (2011). But the seemingly never ending testimony of names,
places, and dates detailing a tranche of human activity challenges this
position. Sitting in Suffolk Record Office subsumed within the legal world of
deeds and the documentation of exchanges between people of property and finance
one becomes overwhelmed by the weight of responsibility to the material, the
evidence of human mortality envelopes you.
Through the editing process’s of sieving and focusing locating the
narrative of the project is challenging as there is so much individual activity
in the form of names long forgotten that there is little space to find one’s
own story. So much stuff, an almost endless tide of human presence that
the previous owners of the belongings I hold are ever present. The objects
surfaces embellished and burnished by repeated handling. Their making touch
imposes itself on my soul, their presence embedded within the objects.
The objects I have handled have a palimpsest quality; the record
of their history reappears on the surface like the traces of old texts to be
read, a memory of use, cumulative palimpsests. I am reminded of a work by
Giuseppe Penone 1968, Alpi Marittime – Continuerà a crescere tranne che in quel punto
(Maritime Alps – It will continue to grow except at this point) he created a steel
cast of a hand gripping the stem of a sapling so that the sculpture slowly became
absorbed as the tree grew. Whitechapel (2012) (Figure 7: image of a blacksmith’s
work book at Suffolk Archives and Giuseppe Penone’s artwork Alpi
Marittime – Continuerà a crescere tranne che in quel punto (Maritime Alps – It
will continue to grow except at this point) of 1968).
Sensory perception is the driving force that informs his practice,
evidence, memory and history revealed by traces are central to his process,
making invisible forces and energies visible. The objects I have handled leave
their own mark on me much like the impressions left by the memories located
within the imagined houses of Roman orators.
The seemingly unlimited decision making process that is making art can
be supported by rules. These enable one to focus present options and support
creative decision making. Within this project links to the idea of the hidden
within the fold supported decisions about material choice. Political and
aesthetic factors are embedded within this selection. There are also issues of
quality and value around working materials that in turn connect to the
perceived position of the smock in society. Working with materials is a hands-on
dialogue.
In turn the thinking behind my making has been informed by the use of
utility papers and materials that are usually found within garments, providing
a functional, hidden use. Examples would be within the lining of clothes, as
backing within bookbinding or used within the conservation/storage of
objects. But had I fallen into the ‘trap’ of becoming ‘fascinated with
what might seem to the outsider to be the esoteric props of the archivist's
trade: the white cotton gloves, the cushion........?’ Lane (2013)
The tracing, glassine and baking papers have a physical quality that
hides or knocks back anything that is behind it, creating a sense of the hidden
but when unfolded reveals and celebrates the function of the fold by showing
the layers of the material used. This revelatory moment, the realisation that I
had to work with these materials came from handling an example of shadow ribbon
at the Costume and Textile collection in Norwich within a fabric manipulation
handling box. (Figure 8: image of shadow ribbon at the Costume and Textile
collection in Norwich, 2014). I worked with lining fabric using a combination
of traditional book binding techniques and gathering stitches taken from
smocking, next using a heat press to transfer sublimation dye onto the fabric
whilst it is still bound. The piece is unpicked to reveal the folds and the
trace of what once was. When looking at the final piece the process is revealed
and rebuilt in the mind, it is unpicked its history unfolds. The pieces are a
hybrid of sculpture and process neither one nor the other but a middle point
alluding to both. (Figure 9: image of my work, a hybrid of sculpture and
process, 2014).
I recognise that my work and practice has concepts of order and control
at its core. Extensive use of the book as a vehicle of expression is an
indicator of this. The inherent qualities of materials one works with are
apparent, understood and embedded within every decision. Within this project
the use of fabric has forced me to release a degree of control in the working
process, in essence paper and card ‘move’ less. At times the fabric felt alien
under the hand and too open to possibilities.
Is there a connection between the lines in the ploughed field and the
detail in the smocking on the smocks worn by the people ploughing the field? (Figure
10: image of smock from Costume and Textile collection in Norwich and image of
ploughing the field from Museum of East Anglian Life, 2014).
Many questions were raised as a result of this line of enquiry. What is
the effect of the environment on creativity? Did they consciously recreate the
world they inhabited within the clothes they wore? Is it inevitable that humans
create patterns or seek to find pattern and so order? Which was arrived at
first? I am reminded of the moment, after relocating from an urban to a rural
area. The realisation that within the sculptural books I was creating I was
constructing visual references, macro and micro to the landscape around me;
ploughed fields, horizon lines and the gills of mushrooms. Was this
subconscious or did I as a maker become aware of the motif and its meaning
because I was searching for it? Inevitably the exploration of a research
path presents numerous strands and the constraints of time leave many questions
awaiting examination.
To collect a sequence of objects is, for a moment at least, to have
imposed some sense of order on a universe that doesn’t have any......an attempt
to defy the threat of mortality.....Objects are the way in which we measure out
the passing of our lives. They are what we use to define ourselves, to signal
who we are, and who we are not. Deyan (2008)
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Figures
Figure 10: image of smock from Costume and Textile collection in Norwich and image of ploughing the field from Museum of East Anglian Life.
