Lace from the Helen Louise Allen Textile Collection

×

Expand

courtesy UW Center for Design and Material Culture

press release: Lace from the Helen Louise Allen Textile Collection, on view September 8-November 14, 2021 in the Lynn Mecklenburg Textile Gallery, explores lace as both art and design, featuring 53 laceworks from the Collection. Ranging from an example of five hundred year old metallic lace trim and continuing through a contemporary lacework documenting the domestic isolation of COVID-19, visitors are encouraged to reflect: What is this enigmatic material and what can we learn from it?

EVENTS:

The Overshare: Telling Stories and Documenting a Life in Needle Lace, Thursday, October 21 @ 5:00pm, Online: Sydney-based maker Maggie Hensel-Brown will join the CDMC to talk about her approach as a contemporary lace maker. With work currently on view in Lace from the Helen Louise Allen Textile Collection in the Lynn Mecklenburg Textile Gallery, Hensel-Brown;s artist talk will discuss how she came to lace making and the stories she tells through her work. This event is free and open to the public. Please register in advance:

https://uwmadison.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJYrdO6hpz8qGdd5RJJlsSr_N0beF6T56Uxl

Lace is a unique and flexible category of textile defined by distinctive open spaces rather than a single fiber, technique, or region of production. It is also, at 1500 objects, the single largest category of material in the Helen Louise Allen Textile Collection. Lace has its origins in utilitarian netting and in elaborate dimensional embroidery. In sixteenth-century Europe, lace–primarily in the form of elaborate neckwear–became a fashionable display of wealth, available only to the aristocracy. Swiftly changing fashion trends drove innovation and soon regional styles and industries developed. In the nineteenth century the proliferation of more affordable lace and a general interest in historicism led to an interest in antique lace collecting. Today and for much of the last hundred years, most lace has been machine made. Handmade lace has had a creative renaissance, alongside other fiber arts, since the mid-20th century with many makers stretching expectations about what lace can be to create unexpectedly modern works of art.

Associate Professor Sarah Anne Carter, Executive Director of the Center for Design and Material Culture, explained, “This exhibition is supported by a legacy gift from Katie Sweeney and is the fifth and final donor-supported exhibition of the 50th Anniversary of the Helen Louise Allen Textile Collection.” Carter continued, “Sweeney’s interest in lace related to her Irish heritage and the many trips she made to Ireland to learn about different lace techniques. She expanded her knowledge of lace making traditions during trips she made to other countries. She would be delighted to see this dramatically beautiful and intellectually rich exhibit, presented through the vision of a School of Human Ecology graduate student.” Exhibition curator and Design Studies PhD student Maeve M. Hogan designed the exhibit to introduce viewers to the aesthetic possibilities of lace, “My hope is that visitors to the exhibit will form a personal relationship with these extraordinary pieces of handwork and see them as a source of inspiration. By treating lace as both art and objects of material culture I hope to share how to see lace in new ways.””

Lace engages with the material techniques of lacework, showcasing lace making tools and in process objects alongside fragments of garments, decorative objects, and contemporary art. This exhibition investigates the complex historical, cultural, technical, and aesthetic histories of lace, guiding visitors to a more nuanced understanding of this frothy, knotted, netted, and intriguing material.

Lace from the Helen Louise Allen Textile Collection was developed with generous support from the Katie Sweeney Fund for Education in Textiles, Culture, & Design. To learn more about the exhibit and upcoming related programs, visit cdmc.wisc.edu or sign up to receive the latest gallery news and events by email.