Research Fellowship Project
November – December 2019 and November 2020
Project Title: Geographies of Making: Tracing the Material Gestures of Craft
The aim of this research investigation is to gain new perspectives on textiles and ways of sharing the traditional wisdom embodied in craft practices through development of interactive media interfaces and artefacts. The research objectives include recording details of practices which may not exist in the future; revealing new perspectives about craft; and informing design of human-computer interaction, haptic interfaces and digital tools of the future.
The research project investigates a selection of Chinese textiles in the MAAS collection based on the methodology of Material Culture Theory (Jules Prown). From narratives constructed around each artefact, lines of connection will link to places, histories, cultures, stories, textiles, traditions, rituals and customs which will inform the design of a series of critical and speculative artefacts and interfaces.
Dr Patricia Flanagan is an artist and academic. Her work has, at its foundation, a systems thinking approach. Her practice includes public art, site-specific sculpture, social sculpture, sculptural installation, wearables and performance installation and is published in numerous books and journals including Germany’s leading arts journal Kunstforum. Flanagan established the Wearables Lab at the Academy of Visual Art at Hong Kong Baptist University in 2009 where she worked as Assistant Professor until joining UNSW Art and Design in 2016. She is the founder of ongoing experimental research initiatives: Haptic InterFace (HIF) and the Peripatetic Institute for Praxiology and Anthropology (PIPA). Flanagan’s work is represented in private and public collections in Australia, Ireland, Germany, Italy and China, including the Hong Kong Heritage Museum. Recent exhibitions include Taipei Museum of Modern Art. She is the winner of four CASP funded Public Art commissions, a UGCTD Grant to develop PIPA; representative for Oceania at the Tournai Contemporary Textiles Biennial Belgium; winner of The Max Fabre Foundation Award for Environmental Awareness; and was CeMoRe Visiting Fellow Lancaster University in 2015.