TALK + DISCUSSION // CONFLICT TEXTILES WITH ROBERTA BACIC

OF A LIFE/TIME is a discourse on memory and identity by two unusual makers whose practices centre around notions of thread. Now on show at The Gallery of Everything, a Central London commercial space dedicated to art-makers working beyond the cultural mainstream, OF A LIFE/TIME showcases the embroidered autobiography of Belarusian artist and storyteller OLGA FRANTSKEVICH, alongside the figurative diagrams of sewing machines by Beninese draughtsman EZEKIEL MESSOU.

To coincide with the exhibition and the resurgence of interest in textiles as a medium for expression and storytelling, The Gallery of Everything presents CONFLICT TEXTILES, an illustrated talk by Chilean curator, human rights activist, and researcher, Roberta Bacic. 

This open-forum discussion will examine the evolution of textile art into a means of resistance, and its role in memorialising violence, injustice and oppression. The work of OLGA FRANTSKEVICH will be discussed within the context and history of the medium.

This free event takes place from 2pm to 3.30pm on Sunday 3rd February. Spaces are limited, so please RSVP to pa@gallevery.com.

ABOUT THE SPEAKER

Chilean curator and human rights advocate Roberta Bacic has curated over 100 exhibitions worldwide on the use of textile language as a form of resistance in the struggle against violence, injustice, oppression and forgetting. Bacic is the founder of CONFLICT TEXTILES, a collection and archive of textile narratives of conflict from around the world.

OF A LIFE/TIME

The Gallery of Everything presents OF A LIFE/TIME, the first international exhibition of contemporary tapestries by Belarusian artist and storyteller, OLGA FRANTSKEVICH.

Exhibiting for the first time outside the eastern bloc, FRANTSKEVICH authors hand-woven episodes which recall a childhood of conflict through reminiscence and dream. A sense of urgency pervades the self-propelled practice. Today, as she enters her ninth decade, FRANTSKEVICH reclaims an intensely personal history for the collective memory - not with the pen, but with the needle.

In dialogue with this tactile materiality are the diagram/drawings from the everyday discipline of EZEKIEL MESSOU. From his atelier in Benin, MESSOU has evolved an encyclopaedic inventory of repair. Portraits of sewing machines, draughted with ballpoint and lead, form this informal opus of difference and repetition – identity-stamped with pride, and for all to see. 

THE GALLERY OF EVERYTHING
4 CHILTERN ST, LONDON W1
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