Horizontal Crossings: GROUP EXHIBITION
Hanshan Art Museum

Horizontal Crossings was a project exploring how a single ‘thread’ can connect people, and how this simple element, together with the technique of stitching, can be transformed into both embroidery and fine art. Curated by Assadour Markarov, Professor in the Fiber Art Department at the School of Sculpture and Public Art, China Academy of Art, the project and accompanying exhibition involved graduate students from the department alongside working artists. 

Markarov wanted to give his students along with professional Chinese silk embroiderers a chance to explore contemporary Western embroidery. He invited Alice Kettle and Pauline Nijenhuis to take part in a residency and lead a five-day workshop, with lectures and interviews at the Hanshan Art Museum running alongside the exhibition.

 For this project, Alice Kettle explored historical and contemporary embroidery as significant and specific cultural practices, drawing on the historic trading relationship between England and China and the exchange of stitched knowledge along the Silk Route. Her research examined the relationship between traditional stitched practices and their contemporary interpretations, focusing on how these cultural forms intersect, enable the exchange of ideas, and foster collaboration between English and Chinese contemporary textile artists. Embroidery became a means of communication, intervention and shared understanding.

A collaborative artwork was produced using shared stitched methodologies. Designed and directed by Kettle, the work sought to integrate Chinese and English approaches and to open discussion around new, co-created practices. ‘Journey of the Thread’ was exhibited as part of Horizontal Crossings alongside three existing works by Kettle at the Hanshan Art Museum, Suzhou, and was subsequently acquired for the museum’s permanent collection with the support of SND Culture and Tourism Group Hanshan.