Tower and Town, May 2024 (view the full edition)Encounters with Textile and StitchOn a warm, sunny day in July 2022 as I was walking to Ann Louise Smith's Open Studio in Cardigan Road (part of the Marlborough Art Trail) I was thinking to myself, as I often do, how lucky I am to live in Marlborough with its rich cultural life. I was not disappointed. Ann had opened her studio on a weekday for textiles and tea. Going down the side of the house I entered the back garden with its lush lawn dotted with apple trees onto which the studio opened. The room was full of the sound of female voices and an exciting array of different textures and bright colours with inks, paints and printing techniques on paper and fabric, further embellished with hand and machine stitch. It was inspiring to see what is possible with mixed media and a vibrant imagination. In this welcoming environment Ann told me about Textiles and Stitch around Marlborough (previously a branch of the Embroiderers' Guild) which meets in Kennet Valley Hall. Women come from all over the area including Swindon and Corsham on the first Monday of the month for a talk by a textile artist. Optional workshops are available once a month offering opportunities to learn new techniques or develop skills. As we work, we talk or lapse into productive silences and have tea and cake or biscuits, often to the gentle whirring of sewing machines. It is extraordinary how different the pieces of work we produce are, how appreciative we are of one another's work and how much we help each other with ideas and advice about stitches, techniques, and materials. The day is always over far too quickly. I particularly enjoyed the talk and workshop led by Michala Gyetvai who specialises in felted and embroidered work which seeks to capture an emotive and evocative interpretation of nature integrating fine and applied art. Her work is constantly refined throughout the process of making. She told us: "What I do up here [top left] affects what I do here [bottom left]." She suggested we look at the work of landscape artists showing us examples such as Samuel Palmer and Georgia O'Keefe and encouraged us to try out combinations of colour, shape, stitch, and texture in small experimental pieces. I was completely happy trying techniques I'd never used before and really enjoyed looking at the widely different pieces we produced and learned so much from. I have since entered two pictures in Michala's style for the Textiles and Stitch Exhibition, 6th-9th June in Kennet Valley Hall, Lockeridge. All are welcome! For further information about the exhibition please visit the website https://textilesandstitch.co.uk/ My encounters with Ann Smith and Michala Gyetvai have led to life-enhancing experiences of new friendships and creative achievement. And it's not just fun, as sociability and learning new skills are important factors in a healthier old age. This is worth bearing in mind at a time when healthy life expectancy has increased but not as much as overall life expectancy such that more years are spent in poor health. A woman in England in 2018-20 could expect to live to on average 83.1 years of which 19.3 years (23% of her life span) was in "not good" health. For men the figures are 79.4 and 16.3 (20%) *. In her book Extra Time Camilla Cavendish writes "Old brains can learn new tricks - and they must, to keep in shape" and in the words of the psychologist George Vaillant: "The key to healthy ageing is relationships, relationships, relationships" [Harvard Study of Adult development]. Textiles and Stitch works for me, what works for you? *Statistics from What is happening to life expectancy in England? The King's Fund, August 2022  Sarah Bumphrey |