An organically woven story
- Imogen blends, spins, and weaves textiles on a handmade loom
- Her process is free, without a predetermined design
- She works with a large range of yarns and wools
Imogen Bright Moon was born in Wolverhampton, where her mother taught her to sew, and her grandmother was a tailor. This is a background in which crafts were a vocation and not just a pastime. Imogen has worked in textile for over 25 years. She was originally a pattern-cutter and costumier, and worked with the Royal Shakespeare Company and Vivienne Westwood. Moving to the East Sussex coast with her young children, she decided to look at textiles from another angle. She built a loom and taught herself to weave using her experience of textiles, machinery, and technology of cloth. Today, from her Brighton studio, Imogen is an artist who makes ethically principled work. "I have created a narrative in textile language in which it is the material speaking," she explains. Imogen is happiest making large works that can be used in a multitude of ways.
Interview
- What are the ethical principles of your practice?
- I use fibre responsibly; I let the material guide the design process; and I do not use dye. I want to be as minimal as possible, carrying out a craft with a gentle footprint that is traceable, accountable, and responsible.
- What fibres do you work with?
- Originally, I was gifted a huge supply of British alpaca wool, bales of sheep’s wool from a sheep rescue, and fibres from yaks, angoras, and even dog wool. I might add linen or wild silks – it was a cross-disciplinary of materials.
- What is the colour palette of your work?
- I only work with the natural colours of the fibres – with the spectrum of different wools. The brown wools, rose alpaca, grey wools that are almost purple, and I blend in other fibres to bring out the shadings. This is almost a painterly blending.
- What is your heritage?
- My dad is Irish, my mum is British Romani, with a lineage back to tribal peoples of North India and Iran. She taught me my craft, and I feel I have a very direct link to my cultural heritage. I think the gift of craft is to communicate across time and culture.
Imogen Bright Moon is a rising star: she began her career in 2016 and she started teaching in 2019
Where
Imogen Bright Moon
