Norfolk Contemporary Crafts Society

INSPIRED:

Norfolk Contemporary Crafts Society

Annual exhibition in the Hostry at Norwich Cathedral

Norwich Cathedral Hostry

25th November 2014 to 4th December 2014

Norfolk Contemporary Craft Society are once again “Inspired” at Norwich Cathedral Hostry this year, with their exhibition running from 25th November until 4th December 2014.

The exhibition displays the skills of Norfolk’s finest Craftspeople, with some very exceptional and beautiful work produced by International masters of their Crafts.

Even thought the NCCS is over 40 years old it is an evolving society, with new members joining every year. There will be three new member’s exhibiting at “Inspired” Judith Ellis; a bookbinder, Jo Clark; three dimensional weaver and Ann Lamb; jeweller.

Ceramics, textiles, woodturning and silversmithing are amongst some of the more familiar of the Crafts to be exhibited; however Barbra Prices’ polyester cast resin jewellery and NCCS Chair Nicola Gibson’s 3D wire knitting are far from traditional. This goes to show that Craft in Norfolk is not only thriving, but adapting to new and exciting materials and practices.

Nicola Gibson is entirely self taught machine knitter and perhaps this is why she saw no boundaries in its possibilities. About four years ago she read you could machine knit using wire, and went out and brought herself a supply of 0.2mm wire and set to work, creating pleasing shapes of mainly leaves and petals.

The real break though came when she did a collaboration with another artist on a fish. This developed into sardines in tins; mimicking the material of the tin can, and the knitted surface suggesting the scales. Whilst exhibiting these little beauties Nicola was given a commission to produce a Hare sculpture using the same techniques. To produce something larger and freestanding Nicola decided to start the hare by modelling it out of modelling clay to work out the component parts, of which there were 11. An armature was also needed to make sure the animal stood up and his ears stayed erect.

The Hare commission lead Nicola into creating more animal forms. For the Inspired by Birds exhibition at Norwich Castle Museum this summer Nicola produced a 3 Strand Cockerel. The experimentation has not stopped. Nicola is currently using glow in the dark embroidery thread and lurex for an extra night time dimension!

If you would like to keep updated on Nicola’s making activities, you can find her on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/colabeancurios.

The exhibition runs from the 22nd of November to the 2nd of December at the Cathedrals Hostry, the Private view start at 6pm on Tuesday the 25th of November.

Notes

Norfolk Contemporary Craft Society (NCCS) is the leading Norfolk association of designer-makers. Members encompass traditional to cutting-edge designer crafts.

The NCCS was founded in 1972 to

  • set and reflect high standards in craft works
  • provide opportunities for members to interact socially, while encouraging continuing, professional development
  • raise public awareness of good design and high quality in small scale production

“Our intention in establishing the Society in 1972 was to give encouragement and support to contemporary craftsmen especially those living in Norfolk, and to increase public awareness of their work. Our emphasis has always been on quality of design and workmanship with, ideally, a perfect union of the two”. Francis Cheetham one of the founding member

http://www.norfolkcraft.co.uk

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