Jonathan Baldock, Holly Hendry, Tonico Lemos Auad and Yinka Shonibare CBE RA feature in ‘Material Worlds’

Material Worlds: Contemporary Artists and Textiles illuminates the diverse roles textiles play in artistic practice.

The exhibition brings together artists who take the intimate and domestic quality of textiles and transform them into theatrical, bold, unsettling and humorous artworks that inspire, challenge and offer new ways of thinking.

Featuring work created predominantly over the last decade by 15 UK-based artists, Material Worlds highlights their deep awareness of textiles’ cultural history and a shared desire to challenge its traditional associations, testing the material’s expansive and subversive potential. 

The familiar fabric of everyday life is reimagined into the unexpected – the ordinary made extraordinary – to reflect on ideas of gender, identity, community, race, technology, and myth; demonstrating the medium’s potential to transform in the hands of different artists.

Exhibited artists include Jonathan Baldock, Holly Hendry, Tonico Lemos Auad, Yinka Shonibare, Caroline Achaintre, Larry Achiampong, Phyllida Barlow, Alexandre da Cunha, Paul Maheke, Anna Perach, Yelena Popova, Paloma Proudfoot, Rae-Yen Song, Tenant of Culture and Zadie Xa.

Opening Tuesday 8 October, 6-8pm, including a special performance by multi-award-winning artist Anna Perach at 7pm.