L.J. Furner

Delighted that my textile piece, Seaweeding is part of the Gallery Cafe’s Hidden Talents exhibition in Bethnal Green.

Bringing together photographic, mixed media and textile-based work, it’s a pleasure to have my work on the wall of the cafe over the next few months alongside so many other fantastic artists.

Seaweeding is my largest textile work to date, using recycled fabric to create a wall hanging which draws inspiration from female seaweed collectors of the nineteenth century. Women such as Amelia Griffiths, Mary Wyatt, Margaret Gatty and Anna Atkins collected and preserved seaweed specimens which are now a vital part of many museum collections.

The palette of blue and white fabric mirrors the blue and white cyanotypes produced by Anna Atkins using her seaweed collection, which became the world’s first ‘photobook’. The wall-hanging is hand-sewn / appliqued, and each seaweed is a representation of a specimen that has been collected and pressed in my own collection.