Over the second half of summer I enjoyed a trip to Brighton, Galtres Festival, and volunteering in the Quilt Museum in York.
My trip to Brighton, although we did not visit any galleries, inspired me artistically. The city has an excellent boutique-y feel to it, with a shopping quarter known as ‘The Lanes’ being home to many Designer/Makers. We were also lucky to be staying close to the pier, which in itself is an interesting structure, but also the structure of the original pier that was burnt down still sticks out of the sea. I really enjoyed the view from the end of the pier looking back on Brighton, making it look like a tine model town.
Much like Glastonbury, I enjoyed Galtres festival as an artistic experience. It's a much more local festival, and I found it interesting talking to designer/makers who had stalls about what it's like to work as a textile artist in a much more rural and sparsely populated region such as Yorkshire (as opposed to London or Manchester). Many told me they lived on the farms where they raised the sheep for wool and grew natural dyes. They also spun their own yarn and handmade the products, I absolutely loved this idea of a "self sustained artist" and how affective sourcing supplies could be if you lived in a less linked in area of the country.
What I also liked about Galtres was the interesting decor of some of the cozier acoustic tents and their interesting use of interiors outdoors:
Finally I loved working at the quilting gallery. I mainly helped out with basic embroidery classes for people of all abilities. The thing I loved was that not only was I being creative but I was enabling others to be creative which gave me great satisfaction. I feel I would really like to work on community arts projects in the future!
