Reviewer: Kerry-Anne Cousins

The theme of connection links these three separate multilayered exhibitions. The artists explore the concept of connectiveness not only between themselves but also with their community - a community that includes the natural world. In investigating this theme, they have used a wide variety of media and techniques from drawing to digital technology, from traditional weaving and embroidery to complex assemblage.

Ruth Hingston and Jodie Thatcher (Connect with your Nature) were the 2015 artists-in-residence at Gudgenby in the Namadgi National Park. Hingston's recent work in embroidery maps the world around her with gentle satiric humour. In Namadgi, instead of the native fauna she expected to see, she was fascinated by the rabbits and the mathematical formulas the park rangers use to estimate their population. Her works in this current exhibition portray this journey of investigation and seem to pose the question of just how all the information she gathered can be made into a final work. Although the large embroidery panel (Mapping Bunnilong and Map References) was perhaps intended to bring all the stages of this creative process together, I feel that what is of more interest is evidence of the journey itself. Jodie Thatcher a visiting artist from Britain brought perhaps a more resolved conclusion to her residency with several successful textured sculptures in copper. Noteworthy is the silver plated, copper faceted form (Adaption Series) with its delicate linear detailing suggesting the markings on scribbly gums.

The Tamworth Textile Triennial is now an institution and as a travelling exhibition can be accessed by a wide audience. It has existed in one form or another since 1975. During that time there have been seismic shifts in what is understood by craft and textiles in particular. This exhibition, curated admirably by Cecilia Heffer, questions all the old shibboleths and ignores narrow definitions of craft and the exhibition is so much better for it.

The name of the exhibition, Group Exchange, arises from the gathering of the 22 artists from around Australia who were brought together in Tamworth before the exhibition, to share ideas and connect with one another. This resulted in some profitable interaction. A comment by artist Ilka White about "breath" prompted fellow artist Gillian Lavery to consider her relationship with the act of breathing. The result was a large stitched circle composed of variegated black stitches - the thread for each sequence of stitching being measured on the artist's body from mouth to belly button! The name of the work Pranayama refers in yoga to the control of the breath. Lavery stitched for 10 minutes each day for a year to the rhythm of her own breathing. This delicate poetic work is stitched onto softly draped material so it almost moves as if breathing itself. The concept of breath was also behind Anita Larkin's strangely formed trumpet made out of found objects (The Breath Between Us. 2014). To make a sound this trumpet needs three people, one at each stage of the length of the horn to blow together simultaneously. A good physical demonstration of connectedness and collaboration. While these two artists emphasised the need for collaboration between oneself and others, another group of artists wondered what would happen when natural patterns and rhythms of life were disrupted by modern genetic engineering. Alana Clifton-Cunningham's machine knitted work (translocation, duplication, deletion, inversion, 2014) visually show this distortion of gene patterns in her large strangely shaped non-functional garment. Erica Gray's work BioVar (2014) is based on the idea that animals might in the future be bred only for food. She ponders on what effect this consumerism might have on their appearance. Her imaginary creation is an eye catching metallic gold wall sculpture of a large monstrous animal-like "being" created with some impressive textile engineering.

Mandy Gunn in her impressive floor work (Centro-polis, 2014 ) uses "strands" of cardboard and paper cut-out of shopping bags to create geometric constructs that suggest a "metropolis of consumerism". This is a work I readily identified with. I thought it was a clever way of making a point by re-using the bags to evoke the concept of carrying home the things we do not really need and also, through the structure she has built, to evoke the banality and sameness of the modern shopping mall.

Monique van Nieuwland (a Canberra artist) has also made work (Ocean Scape, 2014) using the detritus of consumerism. The artist weaves this detritus (fishing lines, plastic and audio visual tapes) into the threads of her wall tapestries. Van Nieuwland is concerned with the plastic that is threatening the life of the seas. Anyone who has seen the plastic rubbish along the rivers of Asia that will be washed out to sea with the monsoon rains will have no trouble relating to this work of quiet and disturbing power.

Other works are not so overtly political but nevertheless are also reminders of the fragility of nature. Among them is Ilka White's work (Dwelling, 2014) that creates in complex embroidery and fibre a poetic and meditative reflection on the inter-connectedness of all aspects of nature.

The works I have mentioned here are only some of the intriguing and thought provoking works on display. The Tamworth Textile Triennial exhibition is recommended for anyone interested in the many different aspects of contemporary artistic practice.

Alchemy is a small exhibition in the Crucible Showcase at Craft ACT. Emilie Patteson is a fitting artist to include in this group of exhibitions. She has been very successful in collaborating and connecting with other artists and sharing ideas. In Alchemy she has teamed up with fellow Canberra artist Tara Bromham to draw our attention to the sometimes unheeded beauty of nature in this pleasing little collaborative installation of leaves, seeds and flowers in drawings, glass and textiles.