Public Craft

A key focus of the Yorkshire Year of the Textile was to celebrate Yorkshire’s rich textile heritage through public art interventions. The success of this strand of the project is exemplified by work such as Texta Texens, a collaboration between textile artist Sue Lawty; poet, Helen Mort and sculptor, Dan Jones, which is situated in the pavement outside of the Clothworkers’ Building at the University of Leeds and Manmade Fibres, a site specific dance performance by Turveyworld.
The county-wide series of community canopies, which were produced throughout the year, were envisioned as temporary, knitted public art installations. Produced during Knit/Lit community engagement workshops, the canopies would be public art in that they were situated in site specific public spaces; but also that they would be co-made by members of the public. However, reflecting on the process of canopy making throughout the year has led to a re-defining of their position within a public art paradigm and the proposal that they are part of a new construct: Public Craft.