Author: msoph81
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In keeping with the Dun Emer Press ethos, I decided to bind my own sketchbook and use it as a dedicated space to creatively explore and reflect during this project. That it may serve as a visual journal, documenting my ideas, rough sketches, clippings, everything related to this project during my residency, and after. Motif…
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I want the pattern designs on this project to be cohesive with the era Elizabeth and Lily lived in.What really excited me is the sisters association with William Morris. It was his publishing house Kelmscott Press that directly inspired Elizabeth to start Dun Emer Press. The Arts & Crafts movement and Art Nouveau were both making…
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When I began my residency at HydeBridge Gallery, the project was always going to be about Susan (Lily) and Elizabeth (Lolly) Yeats. I wanted to emphasise their contribution to art and culture in Ireland as so little is known about them. But how to translate that contribution with my own creativity was a challenge. I…
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“I tilled it with my two hands and called it my very own” – ‘81, Joanna Newson While developing my Seven Woods pattern collection for my book; created in tribute to the Yeats sisters, I’ve found myself learning a little about William Morris. Lily and Elizabeth both trained and refined their skills in printmaking and embroidery within Morris’s creative…
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“That I may, that I may, wear my love like Heaven” – Donovan It’s 2016 and I’m in a men’s clothes store helping Arden pick out a suit for my sisters wedding. We are shown a selection of ties, all quite lovely but there’s one tie I spot that stood out from the rest. It was…
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“This pleasure-seeking individual always looks his best, ‘cause he’s a dedicated follower of fashion” – The Kinks Once upon a time, on a street named King’s Road, in a rather bohemian area of London known as World’s End, there graced a boutique store that was the touchstone of 1960’s fashion. It up-cycled unwanted garments, ignored gendered…
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Just a 20 minute walk from Sligo town along the Garavogue River, you will arrive at a very pretty but unassuming place, Doorly Park. As you walk toward the iron archway and gaze out upon the lough, your eyeballs are greeted with stunning mountain views. It really doesn’t matter what kind of weather is out, this…
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If you’re going to San Francisco, be sure to wear some flowers in your hair We all have that era in time we’d love to hop in a time machine and visit. Mine would undoubtedly be the 1960’s. If I had to pick a year of that decade? I think I’d have to go with…