Artist studio – tracey doxey

We live in time

I’m pleased to say that I am in the Fronteer Gallery Contemporary Textiles show in Sheffield, running until the 6^th March.

My greatest, longstanding friends came to the opening yesterday at 4pm and I want to say thank you to Verity, Janet, Jane, Sue and Wendy. It’s my first showing in Sheffield and I hope, not my last.

‘We live in Time’, is a knitted textile piece incorporating a hand- knitted vest and two photographs of sisters from 1970. The work is about the gaps in the relationship between me and my sister and me not being able to reach her which also takes into consideration the Japanese concept of Ma, the spaces in between (間 ) the silences, the unspoken, past and present.

I was born on 26/06/1963, my sister 11 months later on 27/05/1964. Our mother dressed us identically for about 12 years until we tried to impress our own tastes upon the clothes we wore. My Grandad enjoyed the latest photographic technology available to a working-class man. He took many photographs, particularly in 1970 when I was seven and my sister, six years old. In these photographs, my sister and I stand beside each other but rarely touch – there is an unspoken physical and emotional space between us. All of the images were ‘set up’ in a way for my mother to show that her daughters were ‘well turned out’.

There are hand written words over one of the photographs – ‘What about our Julie?’, which is what I always asked if I was ever given anything. There is a poignancy from then to now, where there is still a wide gap between us.

I have knitted a vest in nine dark colours chosen by my sister as an expression of her choice now. When I asked her what her favourite colours are – she said, black, navy, dark red and mustard – I had to knit with some contrast. We were cut from the same cloth but with totally different personalities. I knitted the same article for myself but it has 100 colours.

‘We live in Time,’ questions the discouraged individuality growing up in a working class home in the 60’s / 70’s – and the ever growing space between sisters.

Here is the making of it –

If you would like to join me in a workshop to help you make your own vest, here is the link and I created a chart of all the motifs and colours I used for the jumper – it is here.

I have also been chosen to be part of the FarField Mill Contemporary Textiles Exhibition, in Cumbria, running from March 19th to 1st June with two pieces. I am very excited about this. There is a ‘public favourite choice’, so if you get to FarField for the show, then, please take a look at mine – the two pieces to be exhibited are below

It’s faintly snowing outside, her in Sheffield. Have a good day wherever you are 🙂

writing

Last week, I spent the most wonderful week at a writing retreat in Northern Scotland, not only because of the incredible location, the great food, the place always being warm and the fires lit, but mostly because I had dedicated to time to revisit the book that I wrote whilst I lived in Shetland.

Whilst I stayed at the retreat, I reframed the entire way that my story was originally written into being mostly letters to Susan.

You may remember Susan Halcrow, (she is in many of my previous posts) who lived in the Shetland croft house that I bought from 1876 to 1960, who became a big part of my life whilst I lived on the Islands.

I know that in part, I also went to Inverness to hear and feel the wind that once accompanied 90% of my life in Shetland, and to see the 180 degree sunset where the sky turned pale pink, then peach and lilac into burnt pinks and deep oranges and to feel the heat from sitting in front of open fires for some time. There is no finer place in the UK, than northern Scotland to see and feel the weather and the changing atmosphere. I very much enjoyed getting up early to light the fires – particularly in the straw bale round house in the grounds, then waiting for the pitch dark stary sky to become lighter and lighter bringing in a new day.

When I reread the story that I had written during the time of living in Shetland, I felt a sense of pride in the fact that I had moved to Shetland, had achieved and lived my dream, then changed my mind and left.

While I was lived in Shetland, I designed and knitted two patterns inspired by Susan Halcrow. The first was ‘Good Wishes for the New Year’ hat and secondly, the ‘Dear Susan’ jumper then easy aran version.

I will be entering my new idea of this story in to an over 50’s emerging writer submission this week and also be submitting it to new agents. I’ll keep you posted. Wish me luck. Xx

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travel far or close up?

Is it true, that the longer we live, the more appreciative we become of the small things closer to home?

Such as the simplicity of setting off from home spontaneously on early evening walk, after teaching, just as the sun is setting far away, where the exquisite but simple chrysanthemums glow in the pink evening light in an allotment, or how the trees cover me in the woods but do not touch each other, and where I walk in an absolute carpet of leaves for miles while the sound of ever present moving water in the over flowing brook accompanies me. A change in 10 minutes from dusk to dark where I noticed every fleeting detail.

And yet, last week, at this time, I was in Amsterdam in the Oude Kerk (dating back to 1200) looking at, gently touching and enjoying beyond all understanding the hand painted linen walls in the Marriage Banns room dating back to 1760. It is called wallpaper but it is linen painted in the finest aqua, duck egg colour overlayed with exotic tulips, chrysanthemums and nasturtium.

These two moments, a time spent walking close to home through a wood at sunset, in the city and finding the blue lined walls in the oldest Church in Amsterdam, affected me in the very same way. A connection to absolute unexpected beauty.

so many things in Amsterdam affected me through the senses of sight and wonder – here are a few.

miss nothing. find joy in small unexpected things as well as the grander wonders of the world.

https://www.instagram.com/traceydoxey/

The space between all things

https://videopress.com/v/jfXNJlog?resizeToParent=true&cover=true&preloadContent=metadata&useAverageColor=true

My field of Art has been knitted textiles for a long time, including a Masters in Knitting at Nottingham Trent University 2016 – 2018. I often placed my knitted textiles into the landscape to create site specific photographic art which explored the social histories of women and the making of knitted articles.

I am currently working on a wall based knitted jumper piece called, ‘I Cannot Reach You.’ It is taking into consideration the Japanese concept of 間（Ma) – the silences and the spaces in between all things, and relating it to the relationship between me and my sister.

I would like to learn about the meaning and concept of the Japanese word Ma 間 and relate it to the way in which I experience life, don’t you think it would make life fuller? We do not have this word or meaning in England and to look at the spaces is as interesting as looking at the solid things.

I would like to explore what ‘Ma’, looks like to me, in the space between all things and use textiles and print to express my new understanding of this. If you are Japanese and have and wisdom to share, please do.

I have recently started to develop Cyanotype prints using pressed wild flowers to create images that are often half present, a little ghostly. I am looking at making wallpaper strips to utilise the cyanotype printing process to create the deepest blue papers with hints of British wild flowers, to look a little at the spaces in between in the prints. Yesterday, I made to sample strips out in the yard at bloc studios, where I have a small space to work.

Currently, I am experimenting and, as you can see, the process is open to risk and failure, but the two wallpaper strips are becoming more loved by me because of the spaces in between. One has less impressions of the flowers than the other due to both my impatience of removing the flowers and due to the wind shifting them but maybe just pure blue is lovely enough with a hint of a story of flowers in smaller areas – less ‘gilding the lily’ to speak.

Today, I hung the papers on my wall at home to really look at what is present and what is a faint mark only, and what is in the spaces. I like the results, in some way, they remind me of the Japanese screens that I saw in the temples in Kyoto. But maybe I need to make them more sparse. Let me know your thoughts.

If you would like to join me in my next online workshops, they are in the link here.

If you would like to contact me about hand printed cyanotype wallpaper strips, please do so 😊

If you would like to follow me on instagram, where there are lots more images, then, I am in the link here

間（ま、Ma）は、the space between.

I have posted previously, that I am currently working on a textile piece called, ‘I Cannot Reach You.’

It is a piece about the space in the relationship between me and my sister. The knitted piece will also encapsulate the Japanese concept of Ma, the spaces in between 間（ま、Ma) the silences, the unspoken past, the misunderstandings in the past and present, it could be in the silence when I hear the sound of a cup being placed in a saucer during a visit. Ma is, the things we know but never say.

My sister and I were born eleven months apart, I on 26/06/1963 and she on 27/05/1964. Our mother dressed us identically for about 12 years until we probably tried to impress our own tastes upon the clothes we were wearing. At that time, my Grandad enjoyed the latest photographic technology available to a working class man – a small camera then a polaroid camera. He took many photographs, particularly in 1970 when I was seven and my sister six years old. In the photographs, my sister and I are beside each other but rarely touching – there is an unspoken physical and emotional space between us. All of the images were ‘set up’ in a way that my mother wanted to show that she dressed her daughters well. In the empty space between my sister and I, there seems to be a lack of intimacy or connection, we are not smiling in any of the images. I remember very little of growing up but I do remember the feel of every fabric of those clothes. Clothes carry so many unspoken signifiers – wealth / or not, clean / or not, fashionable / or not, comfortable / or not. I cannot remember much about my childhood.

Here, we are ‘well turned out’, as my Mother would say. For years, our Nana, my mother’s mother, knitted us identical cardigans to match the identical dresses. She used the wool available to her in those days – nylon from Woolworths.

For one month – from the end of May to June 2024, my sister and I are both 60 years old and are very much ‘like chalk and cheese’. I love my sister dearly and carefully, and she loves me, but I cannot reach her. Our love is not one of laughter or discussion or going places together or tea time calls or spontaneous catch ups or quick visits or trips away together – it is one of careful organisation of a preplanned time and place and length of visit to suit my beautiful sister, who has begun to shut the world out. And, believe me, I can understand that. I cannot reach her but I try. I wait, I hope, I try to reassure but, all I can do is be beside her for just slightly more than one hour at a time that she can manage and I have learned to understand that gift of time. Being with her makes me very happy.

I have initially, knitted something that is recognised as a jumper but it isn’t only that. The wearable, knitted jumper sits well within the intersection between craft / skill / materiality / wool/ textiles/ conceptual art / family / sister’s heritage and cross cultural discussion. ‘I Cannot Reach You,’ is an expression of the space in between us, using the medium of a skilled knitting practice to produce a jumper, that could be for me to wear but that it has a name – ‘I Cannot Reach You,’ it has one sleeve knitted slightly longer than necessary, ending in a knitted glove. The second sleeve knitted in plaited and aran knitted stitches – I chose the Fair Isle for its intricacy and my love of Shetland culture and I chose the Aran sleeve to represent how I plait my hair. Giving the jumper a name, never wearing it and placing it upon the wall, makes it art, right? Textile Art. Now, I am knitting a matching jumper in identical patterns as the first 100 colour piece but this time, it will be knitted in the colours my sister likes, with a blackberry or plain knit sleeve to relate to my sister and how she wears her hair. I hope that one day, we can both wear our respective pullovers and stand closely side by side. Without a space between. But, at the moment, I feel that when the second pullover is finally finished, both will be hung side by side, not touching but with a space in between. Ma 間（ま、Ma)

If you are interested in the Fair Isle Pullover worksheet, it is here in the link

https://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/fair-isle-chart-2 you can knit it for yourself in any colours that you choose. I would love to see your projects, please use @traceydoxey on instragram, then I can see your project oo.

I look forward to showing the two pieces together but for now, I am busy working on the 2nd piece.

Sheffield, studio space

This weekend, I have watched two films online – the first, Jo Jo Rabbit and the second, ‘Hunt for the Wilder People’, both directed, (amongst many other things ) by Taika Waititi, a New Zealand Film Maker, then of course, I looked up Taika and watched his TedX talk from 13 years ago and already saw the influences from his part Jewish back ground in his writing of Jo Jo Rabbit, and in which he stars as Jo Jo’s imaginary friend, Hitler.

In his TedX talk, Taika, says all of the things he does, ‘they’re all tools’ he painted, wrote poetry, made films, travelled, was a comedian and all these things visibly influenced his work then and now.

I looked around at my tools, knitting, crochet, travel, drawing, photography, writing, sewing, colour, landscape, and noticed that, of course, these are my tools. The tools I am bringing to my new studio -which, at the moment looks slightly hopeless on the output front. I am playing with cyanotypes from attending a small workshop here in Sheffield. My hands are dry from washing papers out in water, the washed out liquid colouring my fingers. I wondered if the studio is one expense too much for me because I will not earn from it. And yet, here I am, on a quiet Sunday afternoon, after visiting the Buddhist Centre at Walkley’s, Summer Fair, I am here, present, in this tiny room with windows on both sides, sunshine pouring in, Gorecki Symphony of Sorrowful Songs, playing to me and I am content.

I’ve opened my tin of Lomo photographs from when I lived in the Hutongs of Beijing, the winter of 2010/11 to remind me of the far off places that I have been and to bring a thread of future travel here in to the old steel works building – which embeds me in Sheffield.

I am learning new things and Ideas are coming, practice led ideas but for now, I am excusing my inability to produce anything profound, by say, ‘ I am playing’, though for how long, I do not know.

If you are in Sheffield and want to come and visit me, get in touch. If you would like to support me, then please buy a knitting pattern, this will help pay for my studio 😊 the patterns are here, and very good. The patterns are here

I am making cyanotypes with all the pressed flowers from my garden and from hanging over walls in the city. This is my favourite one so far. I actually like the accidental finding of washi tape that is holding the tiny daisy in place.

When I moved to Shetland, I just flippantly mentioned, ‘write to me’ in one of my instagram posts after I shared my writing space in the croft house. Over 100 people sent postcards, this time, it is different. I am in the city, but I am still me.

Today, I am in an old steel works in Sheffield, If you fancy sending me a postcard from where ever you live, then I would love to receive it. I am in

Studio 10, Bloc Studios, 4 Sylvester Street, Sheffield, South Yorkshire, S1 4RN

Cyanotype

I lived in Beijing for the winter of 2010 and used 3 cameras, my favourite being my plastic analogue Lomo camera. The beauty of Lomo images is that you don’t know if you have captured anything at all on film, or if they will develop and when you get your little pack of prints, all of the images are a beautiful surprise. Yesterday, I got to look back at my lovely Lomo images from the time that I lived in Beijing and Suzhou, by using the negatives in a cyanotype workshop, led by the lovely Andy Dolan held at Carousel Print Studios, here in Sheffield.

I know I had a great time because I forgot about my bike and its safety and I didn’t think about what I could eat next ( much).

Here are some of my cyanotype prints from this workshop and Andy looking brilliant in the last image outside Exchange Place Studios, run by Yorkshire Art Space.

I already have lots of new ideas for grand projects including wallpaper. (why start small) I have rented an artist studio for 2 months to see how I go. It’s good when you find something new that’s exciting. It is good to learn new skills and make new stuff.

here is my previous wallpaper spell, but going forward, I not print lace, I will print summer flowers in wonder blue – just now sure how I can make it work yet.

April Alchemy

Hello hello April 1^st, hello bank holiday, hello drizzle and mizzle hello time – just taking time.

I haven’t written an update on this blog for a while, so today, is the day 😊

I’ve been busy preparing for my online workshop with Rowan connect, knitting sample swatches, getting the colours right and making a new pattern using RFT. My workshop is the first on the first day of 3 at the next Rowan Connect Weekend. https://www.rowanconnect.live/event/april24/summary

If you didn’t know, there are also some great complimentary sessions on the Rowan Connect weekend, when you have registered – one is with Kaffe Fassett, whom I did a workshop with in 1987 at the Hotel Russel in Russel Square in London – it’s called a different name now but every time I pass, I still remember that weekend 37 years ago. I remember the year because I was pregnant with my daughter.

Today, I have just release April’s posts on Patreon. If you have ever thought of moving from you life to live in Shetland, to a house facing the sea, then this post is for you. Each post is a chapter from a book that I wrote whilst living there. If you want to know what the parallels might be, then April’s post will show you the glories of the extreme weathers in Shetland.

April’s knitting post on Patreon is an update on the alchemy of knitting colour. It also has references back to Kaffe Fassett’s knitting patterns from the 80’s.

I am now thinking of releasing a chart for the Pullover that I have been knitting because so many people keep asking for the pattern. I won’t be producing a pattern because the hundreds of hours it takes to knit, test knit in different sizes, up and down scale the pattern to fit everyone, it too much – but I am thinking of releasing a full chart of all the patterns so that anyone can knit it using their own pullover or jumper pattern – easy peasy.

And yesterday, I released a little video on Instagram. It’s got a very Sheffield based theme using the beautiful voice of Jarvis from Pulp as a backdrop, and I am wearing a few of my hats that I designed -oh and a jumper and mits. It made me really happy to make the little film, though, there were two takes because we are only allowed 90seconds of music. (Good to have a frame to work within though) I might do another and keep it to Sheffield based music. Maybe Richard Hawley next, or Heaven 17 or The Human League – all favourites of mine.

Anyway, below is a link to the little film 😊 it is on Instagram

www.instagram.com/reel/C5JSt4sIumu/

I have also been on a couple of workshops myself – one for water colour painting and another to make an Easter flower ring – it is pictured below (after one week on the wall)

Happy Easter Monday

Below is the first little film that I made for Instagram, pre adding music – I had to cut this one but it was totally spontaneous and I really enjoyed making it. You can also see the beautiful Peggy Angus hand printed wallpaper which Emma printed for me.

https://videopress.com/v/LazCwJab?resizeToParent=true&cover=true&preloadContent=metadata&useAverageColor=true

Videos without sound are less interesting, but I think you get the idea 🙂 think of Jarvis, singing Common People and you’re there 🙂

The needle shop, Kyoto.

Misuyabari

After waiting for it to open, to being completely overwhelmed by the contents of the tiny place, from listening to the owner who is the 18^th generation of over 400 years of the same family, to sell sewing needles, in this tiny place – down an alley in a shopping mall – to restraining myself and replacing the initial selection. Then, after buying my painstakingly considered choice, I sit in the zen garden in front of the tiny shop hoping for the jade green bird with the white circles round it’s eyes to return. A steady stream of women visit and ponder the wonders of sewing needles. Not just any sewing needles but French ones and Japanese ones for silk kimonos, long ones for denim and then, the very special hand made ones which are so very expensive that I still don’t think they pay enough for the skilled craftsman who hand-makes a steel needle with an eye for sewing thread.

I ponder the wonders that I have just seen – some of which, I cannot see well enough to see the eye at the end of the finest needles hich a Japanese seamstress uses. The owner, explains to me he lost his hair in 2000, whilst he is pulling out small cane woven baskets from under the counter, containing sewing needles in their neat rows related to sizes, which are placed inside a neatly fitted cushioni. So when I look and try to figure out which needles my friend in Shetland might want, he patiently tells me the story of each size and what they are for. I choose us both the same – French needles – sizes 6 and 7’s then we have a hope of threading them. I buy a pack of 8’s and also a tiny hand-made pin cushion and one of those wire things to aid threading a needle with a tiny eye, which he promptly tells me is not special ( you can buy this anywhere) and it will break. But, the needles are another story – fine packaging is the appeal too. The owner counts up how much I owe him but I don’t really mind. A Japanese lady, about my age, and he mother, in her 80’s are in the shop with me. The mum is so lovely – I hope not to sound patronising, which I also say to the daughter when I say that her mum is adorable. She has shrunk to tiny and she is as sharp as a pin herself. This is their first time in the shop although the mum lives close by. Her nifty hands feel the needles, as did mine.

The shop is a tiny explosive experience of need/ want/ desire management which requires restraint. After all, they are only needles and only a pin cushion, aren’t they?

As we three customers chat, the owner points out the marvellous bright green little Kyoto bird that has flown into the garden for the oranges. It is exquisite, so after I have paid, I move to the bench in the garden, waiting for it to return while a new stream of buyers file past, into the tiny shop. This exquisite little heavenly garden fronting the shop is a dream – granite bird water baths, large stones covered in moss like the moss gardens in the temples, small low growing lilac flowers, deep red camelia, berries and two trees. Irises too.

No bird returns so I finally haul myself off the bench and head back down the tiny alley to the crazy life outside this calm oasis.

The needle shop is Misuyabari, located on Sanjo Dori inside the shopping centre – it is closed on Thursdays. It might take you till then to find it.

One Day Colour Blending workshop in Sheffield – 16th September 10:30 – 16:30

_{200 colours to work with during the afternoon session}

I am really excited to share with you that I am finally runing a full day Colour Blending workshop for Fair Isle knitting, here in Sheffield on Saturday 16^th September 2023, 10:30 – 16:30 GMT

The Venue is the lovely Dorothy Fox Centre, Botanical Gardens, Thompson Road, S11 8RB, as pictured below.

On the day, I will provide:-

A morning of tuition on how to blend your colours in your knitting projectes. A collection of over 200 balls of Shetland yarn to choose from to knit with during the afternoon swatch knitting session. Print outs of tuition presentation from the morning colour blending lesson. A printed Sea Urchin Hat pattern to work with after the workshop, to practice your colour blending. Graph paper to practice your colours and coloured pencils. Plus print outs of the motif for you to experiment with colour to knit your swatch.

Experience Level of participants – Anyone who can knit a stitch and purl a stitch can join this session. Anyone who wants to experiment with and understand colours within motifs. This is a morning tuition workshop plus time to experiment using your new found confidence with colour by knitting a swatch such as the examples below, during the afternoon.

This is a skills based, creative, confidence-boosting, fun, experimental, workshop where you will learn the skills to enable you to successfully and confidently choose and blend your own colours for your own projects.

The workshop is based around the tree and star motive in my Sea Urchin Hat pattern., which you will receive on the day.

During the first two hours, I will teach you the principals of colour blending then show examples of different motifs. After lunch, you will be able to experiment with the 200 Shetland yarn colours available in the session to knit a small swatch in your own colour choices.

Afterwards, you will take away your colour blending skills to create your own swatches and choose your own colours for your future projects and you will be able to look at your own stash of yarn with a different eye. On the day, I will bring examples of Shetland and Fair Isle knitting and design pattern books as well as my own swatch books for you to look at.

the session will be £80. If you would like me to send you an overview and booking form, please contact me at traceydoxey@hotmail.com and I will get back to you asap.

Excited? I am.

email me at traceydoxey@hotmail.com if you would like to be sent an overview and booking form.

I also teach online workshops – information in workshop tab on this website – here

Link to Botanical Gardens – On Thompson Road, a turning off Ecclesall Road, Sheffield S11 8RB

https://www.sbg.org.uk/how-to-find-us