Research: Thread Bearing Witness
Responding to migration and social injustice by working with refugees on textile art projects to promote cross-cultural understanding.
Research summary
Research summary
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2018 to present
Thread Bearing Witness explores migration and cross-cultural understanding through stitched textiles.
Textiles is a medium suited to collaboration, participation and co-creation. The project treats textiles and stitch as a metaphor for migration — and the lived experience of contemporary migrants — in multiple ways.
By centring on the individual refugee voice via a non-verbal creative practice, the project builds trust and equity. Making things together helps the researchers to engage with, and be informed by, marginalised people who deal with the broader issues of migration and social injustice.
Aims of the project are to empower the individual through craft, and to represent human dignity with ambitious collaborative artworks. This involves contributions and works from refugees in European camps and in the UK.
The project is developing an original model of co-creation and hybrid forms of pattern and practice. Multiple activities are delivered with refugees, artists, the public and schools, using textile art to start conversations around people movement.
A related project, Stitch-A-Tree, explored stitch as a unifying symbol in support of refugees. The team created a forest made of over 10,000 contributions to highlight refugee voices in debates on marginalisation.
Success can be measured by the extensive engagement across digital platforms, with 37,000 website visits and over 300,000 visitors across the project strands.
The project engages movements such as craftivism (Carpenter 2010, Corbett 2013, Greer 2008). It uses making for collective empowerment, expression and negotiation, and keeps critical discourse central to artistic production and sharing. It treats inclusion as a means of protest and socio-political change.
Funding is from the Arts Council of Great Britain, the National Lottery Heritage Fund, Hampshire Cultural trust, Whitworth Art Gallery and Karachi Biennale Trust.
Research outputs
A Thread Bearing Witness project website.
Two books: Wellesley-Smith, C (2020) Resilient Stitch Batsford and Stein, L (2021) Shedding The Shackles: Women’s Empowerment Through Craft Bloomsbury
This project has also resulted in exhibitions at venues including:
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Whitworth, Manchester, 2018-2019
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British Textile Biennale, 2019
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Somerset Museum of Rural Life, 2021
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Hangzhou Textile Triennale, 2022
Other research outputs include articles and interviews about the researchers and the project.
Gallery
Research team
Research team
Lead researcher
Project Collaborators
- GROUND, 2018: Made with contributions from Pipka/Lesvos Solidarity, Ahmad Ali, Somaya Hossaini, Yakob and many other residents at Calais refugee camp working with Suzanne Partridge; Nahomie Bukasa, Sahira Khan and Ai Ling with Linda Leroy at the Helen Bamber Foundation; Nisrin Albyrouty, Khouloud Alkurd, Heba Almnini, Heidi Ambruster, Marwa Ammar, Amal Ayoubi, Stella Charman, Susan Colverson, Jenny Cuffe, Lama Hamami, Miriam Jones, Asmaa, Ruth le Mesurier, Vanessa Rolf, Samar Sobeih, Chaymae Yousfi and many children from English Chat Winchester; Farhia Ahmed Ali, Nawad Hersi Duale, Amran Mohamud Ismail with Refugee Action working with artists Jenny Eden and Richard Harris; Julie Firman, Victoria Hartley, Louise Jung, Susan Kamara, Sam.
- SKY, 2018: Made with contributions from Amran Abdi Mohamed, Iqra Abdi Mohamed, Idil Abdi Mohamud, Ayantu Abdii, Abdirahman, Abdi Muse, Farhia Ahmed Ali, Bile Ali Aden, Alias Aliye Musa Aliye, Gutu Habib, Monica Hamakami, Isha Hassan Bare, Nawad Hersi Duale, Muno Idiris Mohamed, Mohamed Ahmed Mezan Ismail, Tajura Lamiso Gatiso, Khadar Mohamud Ismail, Sahra Mohamud Ismail, Amran Mohamud Ismail, Fartun Umar Jimale: all with Refugee Action and working with artists Jenny Eden and Richard Harris; Julie Firman, Victoria Hartley, Louise Jung and Sam. Interpreters: Ramadan Ahmed, Abas El Janabi and Mohamed Hirey.