I’ve mentioned this new art gallery before in my ‘Blanket of Ideas’ post and I’d been looking forward to it opening since I heard about it. Not least because their very first exhibition is David Hockney which was not a disappointment, especially ‘A Bigger Splash‘.

The other thing I was hoping to see was the Blanket of Ideas and sure enough it was there with my little shell stitch crochet square right in the middle! That put a grin on my face for the rest of the day I can tell you :) Lisa Anne Auerbach has a really good photo of it on her website ‘The Little Red Blog of Revolutionary Knitting‘.

If you’re in Nottingham visit the gallery. I’m sure I’ll be spending lots more time there.
www.nottinghamcontemporary.org

Nottingham Contemporary have been working with artist Lisa Anne Auerbach who uses knitwear as a way of provoking good-humoured political discussion. She has created a line of knitwear called ‘Take This Knitting Machine and Shove It‘ for Nottingham Contemporary showing various slogans, song lyrics and sayings.

Following on from this Nottingham Contemporary are planning to exhibit the ‘Blanket of Ideas‘, a huge red and black patchwork blanket with squares knitted and crocheted by Nottingham people, expressing their own political messages. Of course I couldn’t not get involved in this. My square is crocheted in shell stitch which represents a concern for the damage we’re doing to the world’s oceans through over fishing, climate change and pollution.

I loved the shell stitch so much I decided to make something with it that I could keep, so here’s the beginnings of a new winter scarf. It’s getting pretty chilly here now so I’d best get cracking, I’ll need it very soon.

I was going to post a link to a ‘how to crochet shell stitch’ resource but when I started looking I realised that there are many different ways to create a shell stitch. Do a search on Google or YouTube and you’ll see what I mean!

First of all I was really pleased to see my patchwork square on the plinth on 12th August. Here is a screenshot from the video.

You can watch the whole hour of Hazel’s time on the plinth with the patchwork at the One and Other website.  As well as a blanket there was a long piece of bunting made from the squares and mine was on the bunting. You can see it on the video at about 11 min 45 secs.

Hazel also read out my message “Our Actions Have an Effect” (at 20 mins 10 secs) and Claire’s (of Pinky and Boo) message straight afterwards. It was really exciting and moving to listen to all of the messages from women of the East Midlands. Watch it here: www.oneandother.co.uk/participants/Hazel_E

In my last post I talked about the patchwork quilt project for the Fourth Plinth living monument. Well, here’s my patchwork square and a little explanation for my message from the plinth…

The butterfly effect is a simple phrase to describe a more complex part of chaos theory. Basically the idea is that something as tiny as the flutter of a butterfly wing can cause a major and seemingly unrelated event later.

I think our actions are like the butterfly effect. Everything we do has a knock-on to something else and most of the time we will not even know what that is. So, it’s important to try to be aware of the possible consequences of our actions and aim to make them as positive as we can.

This is why my message from the plinth is “our actions have an effect” and the motif of my patchwork square is the butterfly.

Because the patchwork quilt is about celebrating women I’ve used traditionally feminine prints and colours and added the flower which holds the initials of all of the girls and women in my immediate family.

Don’t forget to see the patchwork quilt displayed on the plinth on 12th August at the One and Other website.

I’m really excited to be, in a very small way, part of of this amazing piece of art history by creating one patchwork square (of many) for a quilt which will be displayed on the plinth to celebrate women in the East Midlands.

The ‘Plinther’ who came up with the idea is Hazel Ellerby-Sansom who will take her place on the plinth on Wednesday 12th August at 3pm. She will display the quilt whilst reading out a message for each square. After its time on the fourth plinth the quilt will travel around art galleries in the East Midlands and will finally be auctioned off with the proceeds going to charity. Details of art galleries, dates of auction etc are still to be confirmed as this will be an ongoing project.

Myself and my fellow crafters at the Stitched Up craft group in Nottingham will also be helping Hazel sew the quilt together, ready for its long journey.

The Fourth Plinth project began on 6th July and will end on 14th October 2009. You can watch the footage 24/7 online at www.oneandother.co.uk. Its very addictive!

I haven’t decided on my quilt square design yet but I’ll keep you updated. There will be more news over at our Stitched Up website soon too: www.stitched-up.org.uk

Hazel is looking for women in the East Midlands (it really does need to be the East Midlands only please) to contribute a square for the patchwork. It needs to be approx 10 inch x 10 inch (26cm x 26cm) of any design with a short message attached. Please send completed squares to Hazel Ellerby-Sansom, 17a Fisher Lane, Bingham, Nottinghamshire, NG13 8BQ