Revealing beauty of native wildflowers

An exhibition of textiles by Jan Clark, opening at Timeless Textiles gallery, seeks to reveal the beauty and femininity of Australian wildflowers.

 Many Australians are familiar with the wildflowers of Europe and associate the poppies, daisies, pansies and daffodils of northern hemisphere habitats with connotations of home (meaning Europe) and femininity.

 While most Australians are familiar with our native flowers, they are often viewed in a less significant way. Colonial settlers described them as ‘curious’ or ‘exotic’, but rarely recognised their beauty. We have yet to evolve the flower language of symbols that is intrinsic with European wildflowers. Native wildflowers often don’t have even have common names, and if they do, they echo the European names of Cockspur, Bluebell, Milkwort and Thistle.

 The aim of the Wildfloweringexhibition is to show the native wildflowers of the Lower Hunter Valley as just as pretty as their European counterparts. These small herbaceous plants are difficult to see but in spring they flower abundantly and cover the forest floors of open eucalypt habitats.

 Jan Clark’s wildflower textiles reference wider connotations of women and their association with flowers. The concept of the feminine brings in aspects of beauty, the domestic setting and traditional women’s skills of lacework and embroidery. The textiles have mixed these elements together in collages of printed, dyed and embellished fabrics mixed with found objects, such as doilies, laces and buttons.

 Techniques used in making the textiles include screenprinting, monoprinting, fabric painting, hand dyeing, transfer dyeing, transfers, thread drawing,fabric collage and machine quilting.

The exhibition opens at 6pm- 8pm on 19 July 2012 and continues until 12 August 2012.