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Rosie H. Cook

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2017 Asialink Arts Residency

Asialink+AsiaSoc.23March(1)

  Crazed Puppets

Crazed Puppets 04

 This is not a Kowangan

bundengan-01

#APTCCARN5

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Yesterday we went to the Vernissage of the Art Genève art fair. One of my favourite works was by Iranian artist Zahrasadat Hakim — actually, two of her works. “En levant les yeux au ciel, j'ai vue six avions de guerre” 2023, Glazed ceramic, 77×75×30 cm, & “Le miroir ne me contient pas” 2023, Embroidered cloth, mirrors 200x130 cm. Thank you @zahra_hakimm for the beautiful insights into your work. #artgeneve2023
I’ve not posted nearly enough about the work I’ve been doing with @gallerybrulhart, considering what a huge part of my life it has become! Last week was the launch of our latest exhibition, and was a huge step up for me in terms of being able to collaborate with our beautiful artists, their work, and the audience – and especially working closely with the curator of the exhibition. In addition to the exhibition launch party, we also organised a “dialogue event” where two of our artists discussed the theme of feminism(s) threaded through their practice as African contemporary artists, with each other, the curatorial team, and the audience. I’m so grateful that the gallery director is open to suggestions of how we can put our artists front and centre of our gallery, from including videos and texts in our displays, to hosting these events where people can directly engage with the women behind the artworks. I have a lot to say and show about all this but since I am writing a thesis about this internship (due in a couple of weeks….) I should be focusing the outputs there for now! #gallerybrulhart
9 years ago in Trongsa, Bhutan. A Facebook memory providing me with another submission for #rosielovescircles.
How do you solve a problem like… packing contemporary art, involving mixed media combinations of increasingly fragile organic materials, sewn onto a canvas stretched over a chassis? Well… I’m working on it. #conservatorproblems
Spotted and immediately added to my personal collection, during a visit to the Musée d’Art et d’Histoire de Genève.
Just made a last minute visit to the Helvecia photography exhibition at the MEG, which ends today. It covers is a topic I hold close to my heart: understanding that there is no singular, objective, scientific truth. There are a multitude of lived experiences and interpretations thereof. I wasn’t sure what to expect, as it is simply promoted as “a forgotten colonial history”, photographed by Dom Smaz. The people who share their story in Helvecia are often unconcerned with the “facts” of the colonial origins of Helvecia — but even though their own stories don’t always align with those of the Swiss and Brazilian archives, taken together, they build a simultaneously more meaningful and accurate account. Like a blurry mosaic which gives a much more precise account of history and its repercussions through time. I loved this exhibition, and I hope that the audiences appreciated more than the beautiful photos and strong personalities that came across in their video interviews. #Expohelvecia walks a very subtle line between trying to provide entertainment and education (given its museum context) and giving justice to the complexities of colonial pasts as they are experienced in the present.
Just a little Friday night stitching after a week of coughing - I saw @wearemadaher have a sale on at the moment and honestly hard to resist but I already have two projects from there to finish before I start collecting more! #embroidery
I’ve been too sick to stitch but today I was happy to feel well enough to go through my pile of embroidery designs and select a new “small” project, having finished my golden poppies cross-stitch. My “big” project has remained untouched since early November sadly — the Quinto Acuto will not be finished by the end of the year. Anyway, today it’s been an absolute joy working on this gorgeous chintz-inspired embroidery kit! I first spotted it early this year and was immediately in love with it; my mother gifted it to me after asking me what I would like to celebrate 2 years of my own motherhood — this was my immediate request! It’s a really beautifully designed kit with a painted chintz base, from @wearemadaher (also they are so lovely and provide incredible customer service). I can’t wait to get to work on this some more — it’s also so relaxing after counted cross-stitch, where a single wrong stitch can throw your whole design off. #embroidery #rosielovescircles
Finally found a use for the #oddrunembroidery blanket I focused all my PPD energy into two years ago when we moved from Taiwan to Geneva. 🎄
A dreamy Christmas Eve for me = baby goes down to sleep at 7:45pm and I work slowly on this black-on-black darning project, going cross-eyed in between coughing fits. Whilst eating a Terry’s Chocolate Orange we found at Intermarché today! Only €3.90, bargain 😝 enjoy this ugly photo that definitely isn’t grid-worthy. #darning
Where’s the ironing filter? I could wait to share this until I’ve pressed and even perhaps mounted it, but to be honest I have other things to do and also emotions to process about it. At times I’ve been motivated by spite to finish this cross stitch piece because the pattern was so badly designed I wanted to get it done and give it a detailed review pointing out all its sins (including that the design was stolen from a tattoo artist, a fact I learned too late after starting). Unfortunately the designer deleted it from their Etsy shop just days ago so no reviewing for now 🤷‍♀️. Crumpled and rumpled and possibly missing some back stitches (impossible to read the pattern clearly to make sure!), I still think it’s a beautiful image of golden poppies, based on an original design by @c.remington.art . #crossstitch
Just such a great day at the @mbruelhart x @couleurs_de_femmes workshop today, making a 2023 vision board collage, inspired by @nkulyree’s artwork #gallerybrulhart #collage
On Saturday I attended a @noircirwikipedia workshop. The purpose of Noircir Wikipedia is to address the “over-white” nature of French Wikipedia — the subjects, the sources, and the people writing the articles, are overwhelmingly white. Noircir Wikipedia teaches users to write and edit French-language articles with a decolonial, anti-patriarchal lens. One outcome for the workshop was creating a French language stub for #bundengan and it just turned up in my weekly Google alerts, reminding me it needs further fleshing out…
I used to hate backstitch but I’m addicted to its effect on this project. I was meant to be in bed an hour ago [sleep when the baby sleeps] but here we are #crossstitch
Last night I came up with the idea to use a glass yoghurt pot over a light — initially my phone’s torch, then when I moved to bed, my trusty Kindle — as a backlit darning mushroom. It’s amazing. I highly recommend. Somehow my backs look even neater than the front now? I took some handy photos — last picture is a comparison between a “freehand” darn and the neat backlit one, if you can guess which is which… it’s a true gamechanger! #darning #visiblemending #kindlehacking
And so my first week of driving solo (combined with parenting solo during a 5-week work trip) concludes, as I am glad to say I passed my french driving test. It turns out I talk to myself when driving and it’s 99% “Oops! Sorry! Eek… Deep breaths… oh well, no harm done…”*
It is with great sadness that I learned from Pak Buchori (@bohori69) that Mbah Mahrumi, the expert kowangan-maker, passed away a fortnight ago. We are many to recognise his legacy and to mourn this loss to the bundengan community. Nevertheless his name is remembered and his work is celebrated — whilst younger generations continue to build the kowangan frames that serve as the base for bundengan instruments, Pak Mahrumi had honed his skill to develop techniques for a beautifully resonant gamelan sound. His bundengans are now a treasured commodity, amongst which is one in the Music Archive of Monash University, collected in 2016 when we first began collaborating with the community in Wonosobo.
I haven’t stitched in a fortnight and today I had my first opportunity to sit down for some quiet #longdogsampler time. My scroll frame immediately collapsed in retribution for all the neglect and constant moving around (it gets in the way a lot) so I had to dismantle it and perform some emergency surgery with the hot glue gun. I just need it to last long enough to finish this piece! Anyway between taking it off the frame and having a clean kitchen table, I seized the moment to document my overall progress on the #quintoacuto #rosielovesquintoacuto #pointedfifth design. I want to believe I can finish by the end of the year, but with James away until mid-December it’s going to be tight! It’s interesting to see the whole design laid out; I added a filter to get a better colour match and it really emphasised the areas where the thread is a different shade despite being the same DMC reference. I’ve lost count of how many skeins of DMC 311 I have used now but well over 40. #xstitch #crossstitch
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