Dr Kinor Jiang
Vision for Future: Digital Jacquard Arts

        The exhibition ofDigital Jacquard Mythologieshas invited six leading artists in the ficld of fibre art including Junichi Arai,LouiseLemieux,Bérube Philippa Brock,Lia Cook,Wen-Ying Huang and Liz Williamson,who all uphold distinct artistie notions combinating tradition and innovation.,and have tirelessly  explored the inte gration of computer technology and traditional Jacquard techniques.Their artistry achievements have set examples for a new era in the field of fibre art not only they are irreplaccable. they also have significant in fhuence on modern textile design and innovation.

        Junichi Arai is the textile desion maestro. and has epochal contributions throughout the decades between. When in the early days computer applications were not entirely popular and some even questioned their potential use,Junichi Araistarted to use computers as his canvas to design Jacquard fabric.He was bold enough to be the pioneer,releasing himself from the restrictions of pen and paper and stunned the textile industry with his extraordinary creations in the areas of digital Jacquard textile arts.He has been re garded as a legend in this era throughout the fibre art and textile industry crossing the 20th and21st centwries.

        Since the 1970s, Arai has inte grated computer techniques with artistic imagination into the creation of digital Jacquard fabric.These digital Jacquard fabrics are rich and complex in variationand differ from traditional textiles.The creating of fabrics with rich textual effects is by no means merely finished with graphic designs or by applving knowledge.He is keen on the formal qualities ofmaterials,the ultimate potential of the technologies, and the equipment he uses.It all depends on his confidence in planning cach design process and in his craftsmanship of production.

        "By gathering soft fibres, like nesting birds,mankind was able to enjoy the straw- like warmth. The mankind desired for cloth,and prayed for the growth of animals and plants as cloth materials.and worshiped cloth as agift from the heaven.Like a newlyborn baby. clothes have limpid breath. a breath of nature.which is defined as self-organization”by Arai.which brings about benefits and mcanings. Arai believes that we should respect the essence and all elements of a cloth and thank the heaven when making a cloth. No matter how sophisticated human intelligenceis,a cloth can only be made at the moment when all the forces-nature,mankind,and universe -are integratedand when accident and necessity are in harmony,every element is indispensable. All the matter has a capability of self-organization,that is, the ability to create a structure by itself.Based on the characteristics ofthe materials being used and the technical possibility,a piece of fabric uses its own force and directs its own birth: these are the origin of his creation of cloth.

 

Figure 1
Jubnichi ARAI
Glacier series, Metallic Sound: Junichi Arai & Kinor Jinag exhibition, Bonington
Gallery, Nottingham Trend University, UK, 2010

 

        Louise Lemieux Berube is a leading fiber art artist specializing at observing from the perspective of a third party the dramatic events that have taken place or are occurring around the world. The movements and rhythms of the dancers have always fascinated her, and they meet her vision of textile design. Contemporary dancers in action have inspired a series of scenes that she has photographed to be woven. By recording a particular surrounding, a group of people, or a series of activities at a certain moment, she is able to depict her specifit and tacit understanding of them,and convery her thought about the mystery of life. Each piece of Bérubé artworks tells an individual story, and every scene is recreated from our ordinary daily life,or as a flashback from fragmented dreamlike memories. Her Jacquard artworks are woven in monochromatic sets of colors, and in addition, fuse characters, scenes, events and time in lively narrative frameworks. Every piece of work by Berube reflects the thought in an intents magnetic field,and in the emotions of its audience who become immersed into the scene. Images of seasons are a pretext to do an in-depth study on color and light effects in Jacquard weaving, which is also regarded as her major innovation in Jacquard artworks.

        Beube's works reveal her boldness in innovation and fascnation in unrestrained creation through the rhythm of image, colour coordination and contrast ,ranging between strong and weak.Under a clear storyline for each artistic creation.Berubéuses various materials in her work.Different materials from traditional fibres to metallic copper yarns and stainless steel wires are used,siving the finalwoven textiles versatile plasticit resulting in a classical multi-dimensional relief effect which the artist secks.She uses suitable materials to link the internal and externalthus composing works that harmoni ze theme and imagination.Berubérelies constantly on textiles themselves to discover new directions in order to refine.develop and explore the process.Her works are,throu gh the computer, an essay that allows her to articulate own creations whichare physicaltactile and visualHer artwork gives us the invaluable opportunity to refect on the meaning of life and reminisce memorable moments.

 

Figure 2
Louise Lemieux BÉRUBÉ
Remember 2
“Digital Jacquard: Mythologies” exhibition in The Fashion Gallery, The Hong Kong
Polytechnic University, 2013

 

 

        As a practitioner at the forefront of highly advanced technology, Phillippa Brock pursues the beauty of order by starting from the fabric structure. She has explored new ways of working with woven structures and been inspired by the theory of Sir Aaron Klug, Nobel Laureate in Chemistry on the structure of viruses and particles of proteins and nucleic acids, and has been researching on innovations of 3D structure textile design. Plain warp and weft intersect with contemporary technology into woven fabric, thus extending the 2D fabric structure into a 3D effect. This has resulted in absolutely stunning designs.

        Brock is now exploring the full potential of the industrial power loom Jacquard weaving method,creatingon-loom finishing’effects,relying at times on informed serendipity to advance new ideas and developments.Key to all her works produced is the full documentation of the weaving experiments undertaken,resulting in process led research as well as the end artifacts -a process of reflective practice.For her works exhibited here Brock explored ideas around the textile piece as the final product;he took an abstract approach, working with non-representational,geometric abstraction compositions as her starting points, and then 3D distorted them through various design,yarn and structure interactions.

        The Self Fold series and X-Form series continue to explore her research in 'on loom finishing techniques which through the use ofyarn properties and layered weave structure combinations,result in textiles with 3Dform either immediately off the loom or with light steaming.The new'X-Formseries explored ideas around x-form paper folding techniques and integrate the use of smart yarns weftwise include phosphorescent and fluorescent,resulting inworks that take on different appearance in both daylight and in UV light. The ‘X-Form’ series have been developed so no electronics or programming are required and it is the inherent properties of the yarns used which create the unique qualities of the series.

 

Figure 3
Philippa BROCK
Self Fold series and X- Form series
“2D – 3D: Jacquard Woven Textiles” exhibition in The Montreal Centre for
Contemporary Textiles, 2012

 

        Lia Cook has been at the forefront of the intersection of craft and art. Using notions of imaging, memory and emotion, Cook measures the physical human response, and incorporates all this information into her weavings. With a theme of dolls, Cook brings her nicely choreographed, unworldly universe and reveals a strong and indelible visual image to the audiences. Elements such as ‘dolls’ and ‘bundle of nerves’ are implanted into a suspenseful novel-like storyline. Cook’s digital Jacquard creations are like magic boxes with lid removed, allowing us to discover the imaginary and unknown. Artistic spirit flies freely in a mysterious space.Images which had been woven were enlarged and then overlapped with the main objects with computer, and a deep space was structured behind the grid. While weaving a piece of artwork, she also shows us her unique way of creation with the fantasy world as the main object.

        Her practice explores the sensuality of the woven image and the embodied emotional connection to memories of touch cloth.She focuses on the detailan intimate moment in time; as a result,artworks are often woven in oversize scale to intensify a shared emotional and sensual experience.Digital loom is used to weave images that are embedded in the structure of cloth.The digital pixel becomes a thread that when interlaced with each other becomes both cloth and image at the same time.Cookis particularly interested in the threshold at which the face image dissolves first into pattern and finally into a sensual tactile woven structure.This is an engrossing adventure that the artist integrates psychology,semiology and neurology with reality and shows the sensation of her textile construction with points,lines and forms,particular in terms of the surface texture.The mystery of the theme implied is fully revealed with the perfect use of digital Jacquard techniques.The works breathtakingly lead viewers to a variety of attractive faces.

 

Figure 4
Lia COOK
Dark Traces
“Digital Jacquard: Mythologies” exhibition in The Fashion Gallery, The Hong Kong
Polytechnic University, 2013

 

        In contrast to other artists, Wen-Ying Huang is skilled not only in researching digital Jacquard, but also in reinterpreting clothing concepts. In the exploration of costumes and fashion, she strives to turn human sentiment and the beauty of textiles into new dimensions of art. Wen-Ying Huang is a free thinker, and an unbelievable storytelling master in her own way.
        The creation process of Huang is not simply one of concept matching and mechanical assembling. Once she comes up with an idea, she designs and completes her work. The images imply a profound thinking of life, society, time and space behind the scenes. She was most fascinated with the unique capability of rendering realistic images on fabrics when she first came across the CAD Jacquard weaving,and this technology has since  recreated her childhood memories within one of her art series, ‘Memory of Childhood Clothing’. Photography captures a moment by using light to leave the image of that moment on the film.In her works,Iustrous metal threads are used to weave image of that the images seem to emit light on their own as if it is a reverse process of the photographic process.
        Huang believes that costume is a metaphor of humanity or a carrier of human stories or thoughts. To make the costume that the person inside the photo wears is a way to materialize the memory. Because of the material and the way of construction, the rigid clothes are no longer wearable as if they have firmly trapped the memories they contained and nothing will be changed.
        Another work 'Turning Point',linear form conveys the passage of time.Along this passage, images of laughing,shocking and crying are mixed with drought and flood.The fringe and loom waste yarns are kept unfinished tojustify the process of hand weaving. The labor of weaving and the process of making are as important as the final woven image in this series.
 
 
 
Figure 5
Wen-Ying HUANG
Turning Point; 2011; Cotton / polyester; 722 (L) x 100 (W) cm
 
 
        Liz Williamson’s work has been influenced by a number of cultural traditions that span both place and timeHer artistic conceptions are all about simplicityWilliamson's artwork can be best described as profound in meaning and extraordinary in skill. The composition of her works is based on a ‘less is more’ concept with a lot of open space. Relatively, this is an unusual way of composition, in which empty space occupies a larger proportion of the works, and this seems to have adopted the same approach as Chinese paintings in which virtual space and painted areas form an interesting layout.
        “Cloth is a universal material. Everyone uses it, everyday, in many different ways, for warmth, protection, as a covering, for decoration, for health and safety, from birth till death,” she explained. The Jacquard pieces featured in this exhibition are from a body of works titled ‘visible darning’, a series of meditating on cloth and repair, in particular the domestic repair process of darning. The series documents the transformation of cloth through the repair process by examining the impact of darning on the cloth’s surface. Darning is a repair process for cloth, used to prolong the life of a garment out of necessity, for sentimental reasons or on principle and belief. It aims to make new, re-new and restore cloth by the insertion of additional threads into the warp and weft to repair holes, rips, cuts and tears. Notions of containment and protection are presented by a series of works based container shapes, evoking connections with holding,carrying and storage.
 
 
 
Figure 6
Liz WILLIAMSON
Convey series, Wollongong City Gallery, Wollongong, New South Wales, 1999
 
 
 
        These six leading artists have surpassed conventional thinking, and have their own individual and different rationale for art creation. Their works exceed the boundary of traditional Jacquard textiles, their ideas have transformed compositions and ways of expression, and the images they created enrich our visual experiences. The design approach, techniques and materials that have been employed are far different from the  old,traditional expressions in fibre art.These key features highlight their creative spirit
in expressing the design concepts and the brand-new integrated development of CAD design approach and weaving. With vast possession of various materials and modern computerized techniques, these artists have limitless freedom to explore the new, artistic possibilities.The works are then able to bring us new excitement,enjoyment,and inspiration intelligence, mystery, beauty and elegance. We admire those who are keen to learn and bold to explore; they are then able to bring us new excitement, enjoyment, and inspiration for even higher level of creativity.The six internationally renowned fiber artists are such true pioneers, and their works are the blossoms of new technology rooted on the soil of old tradition.
 
        Digital Jacquard: Mythologies is an exhibition introducing contemporary Jacquard works which are made of fibre materials as important means of artistic expression born out of today’s computerizing media environmentto a broad audience.The exhibition features leading artworks in these soft materials to reflect the rich cultural diversity,and in addition, the value of fibre materials in contemporary art is displayed to people through textile artworks.Traditional and new fibre materials are utilized by leading artists to reflect on diverse issues such as technological innovationmass production and consumption, amelioration of the environment, modern spirituality and urban development. As a unique technological feature, digital process evokes people to rethink about the interconnection among art, society, culture, history, economy and industry. An overall spirit of mutual symbiosis between artistic creation and innovation in everyday life is to be created during the exhibition, and at the same time, the development of comtemporary fibre art,texile industry and fashion is to be fostered.
 
 
5 Aug 2013