Please click on each image to see the full artwork.
Untitled, 2017, embroidery and stitching on cotton
This textile is one of 6 created by Harriet Riddell during a residency at the University of Hertfordshire. Over a week, the artist captured daily life on campus and at sites across Hatfield on her bicycle-powered sewing machine. The artist invited passers-by to pedal and power her sewing machine to create delicate line drawings of the people, conversations and architecture around her.
Her practice responds to and captures the transient world, holding them as permanent tapestries. Encouraging interaction, experimentation, her projects are always location-specific and have taken her across the world. Riddell describes her process of sewing and mark making as ‘stitch sketching’.
Harriett Riddell
After Graduating in 2012 Harriet Riddell won the Absolut Vodka Award which led to an in-house artist job for 6 months. She has exhibited her work at the Indian High Commission in London, took artist residencies in Kenya and Hatfield, and self-published a book documenting her three-month journey in India.
Riddell has worked with a charity in Kolkata and Johannesburg designing products and training handicraft artists to free-motion-embroider.
She has recently returned from completing an artist residency with the National University of Taiwan in Taipei. She is currently preparing for an exhibition in Milan, opening January 2020.
Instagram: @institchyou
Hertfordshire Open 2020
This artwork was selected for the first Hertfordshire Open Exhibition. The exhibition online galleries are hosted between www.uharts.co.uk and www.stalbansmuseums.org.uk and will be launched in stages throughout April 2020.
Over 180 artists with links to Hertfordshire submitted their work to be part of the inaugural exhibition. Chosen by an independent panel of judges, the exhibition features 80 stunning works by the 50 selected artists, creating an exciting mix of work by established artists alongside emerging talent and first-time exhibitors.
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