Talking with Textile Artist, Designer and Teacher - Emma Whitehead, The Top Floor Art Gallery and Open Studios, Saintfield, County Down

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The Down about Down Podcast with local textile artist, designer and teacher, Emma Whitehead from The Top Floor Art Gallery and Open Studios based at 92 Main Street, Saintfield, Northern Ireland.

Chris chats to Strangford resident, Emma Whitehead about her textile artwork. She is described as a textile artist "who uses traditional and innovative embroidery techniques to create three dimensional artworks."
Emma also teaches and works with textile groups. Repurposing, reusing and recycling in art projects are very much central to Emma's work.
Remember playing with your grandmother's button box all those years ago? A visit to Emma's studio will bring back lots of memories from yesteryear. Emma reveals in this podcast how her interest in her work started.
Emma is currently working on another project with Linen Biennale based at R-Space Gallery in Lisburn, to create Northern Ireland's largest linen table cloth in Northern Ireland. Emma and a team of stitchers and crafters are working with donations of linen from the public to create a unique "work of art."
You can witness Emma at work on this project on Saturday 9th September at the R-Space Gallery, 32 Castle Street, Lisburn between 11am and 5pm on the first floor "Stitching Room."
Meanwhile, back at her own open studio in Saintfield, Chris notices a unique quilt adorning the studio wall. Emma explains the background to this creation, and reveals how the artwork came to fruition after having received a life-changing diagnosis.
In Emma's own words - " I work with the worn, the used, the discarded and the broken to illustrate the journey of personal artefacts as they travel from usefulness, to inevitable redundancy and then resonate personal stories in new work."
With ongoing commissions, workshops, consultancy roles, and the day to day running of the studio, Emma is certainly kept busy, in a vocation which she is certainly passionate about.

Listen in to find out more!
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For further details on The Top Floor Art Gallery and Open Studios go to their website
www.topfloorart.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/topfloorart