W is for Wallpaper Exhibition

Today some of us visited the Ruthin Craft Centre for the contemporary wallpaper exhibition, which featured Rachel’s work. It was a good opportunity to see a tutor’s piece of work as well as understanding the ways in which someone in the industry works. The workshop with Rachel Kelly really interested me as many of us took part to create a big seasonal feature wall. It also gave me the chance to work with metal leaf flakes and foil, a media that I have not really come across before, yet found really enjoyable. This experience has inspired me to use this media and the techniques of using decorative wall stickers, printing and embellishing processes within my work in the future.

Rachel Kelly's Workshop- Seasonal Feature Wall

There was a beautiful exhibition called Five Sisters and a Family Tree by the artist Susan O’Byrne when we entered the Craft Centre which shown a body of ceramics. The project is a ‘personal journey into the private world’ for O’Byrne whose inspiration came from her own family history focusing on her mother and her four sisters migrations from Germany to Ireland in the mid 1800s. She has used ceramic shapes of animals to portray her family members with the combination of shapes, colour and pattern. I believe it’s an extremely original idea and the pieces are not only stylish and homely but she manages to represent her family. 

Susan O'Byrne, Five Sisters and a Family Tree 2015

The wallpaper exhibition was extremely interesting as I had the opportunity to see both traditional and more current techniques used to create contemporary wallpaper. Laser cutting, photography, block printing, stitching and paper techniques were used to create original and innovative designs for wallpaper. Being completely unbiased in my opinion, I found Rachel Kelly’s work the most interesting. I favoured the combination of print and laser cutting to create negative space where you can choose whether you want to use the piece as a sticker or wallpaper placed on a wall of your choice. It lets the customer almost interact and change the design depending on the colour/texture of the wall they choose. Rachel’s work has influenced me to really think about a piece of work as not just a flat design but something that can be possibly interactive in a subtle way. 

Rachel Kelly Kyoto - CutOut 2015