Opening KNITTED WORLDS

By Suzan Rüsseler, curator KNITTED WORLDS

Friday, 13th of March to me was a very lucky day. More than a year of work with several colleagues culminated in the opening of the exhibition KNITTED WORLDS. The first two weeks of March we set up the exhibition with our technical staff, the graphic designers Annemarie van den Berg en Cecilia Hendrikx and some artists who came to install their work. One of them was Désirée de Baar who built a construction for her Fragment of a building # 1 (see her post in this blog) which she covered with knitted pieces, connecting them stitch by stitch. A work of passion and patience. The same is true for two knitted pieces by Norwegian artist Heidi Kennedy Skjerve. Her husband Stein Rønning and their daughter Magnhild installed Kennedy Skjerve´s two monochrome knittings of several square meters directly on the wall with amazing concentration and precision. - Subtle works with a very strong physical presence.

Friday, 13th. Approximately 200 visitors were present at the opening. Unfortunately it was so crowded we couldn´t offer a seat to everybody. For those who couldn´t attend the opening I review what happened. After words of welcome by our director Ton Wagemakers, I gave a short introduction to the themes of the exhibition, followed by a splendid and humorous speech by British artist Kelly Jenkins (soon to be read on this blog), who came over from London. Kelly is one of the participants of the exhibition and also took the chance to work in the Textile Lab.

Part of the opening was the start-up of a participation project by Anne Reijse, titled Game On. Visitors of the exhibition are invited to knit several objects inspired by computer games. Of course during the opening much attention has been drawn to the exhibited works but I´m sure Game On will grow very soon.

People I spoke during the opening were very positive about the exhibition but of course I´m the curator, so critical comments maybe not reach me so easily. However I love criticism, so feel free to react in this blog.

Photos: Joep Vogels