ABOUT THE ARTISAN

In 2005, together with a handful of other women, she created Oficina do Feltro, a production, research and creation project with the aim of promoting the intersection between artisanal textile production practices and the territories of contemporary artistic research and creation.

The Felt Workshop recovers and reinvents traditional ways of making felt as an individual but also collective practice, using unprocessed wool resulting from shearing. This wool is creamed or carded and then felted. This process, which follows the ancestral practices of creating fabric not produced on a loom, differs from more modern ways of making felt, mainly due to the more immediate use of wool.

SUMMARY

Felting requires in-depth knowledge of the fibre used. From the sheep of the peaceful Alentejo pasture to the felt, the various processes to which wool is subjected echo memories of transhumance, of an original way in which man relates to the land, to animals and to himself. In this two-day Immersion, Diana Regal proposes a special focus on wool as a way of sharpening our ability to listen to our inner and surrounding environments.

PROGRAM

FRIDAY 3rd May

Reception from 6:00 pm

House Spira, Vila Nova da Baronia

(Optional)

SATURDAY 4th May

9:00-13:00 FARM VISIT

The Wool Cycle:

-display of utensils;

-shearing: unprocessed wool

-carding: carburizing or creaming the wool; the cards and the carding machine;

-spinning: the distaff and the spindle and the spinning wheel;

-textile production: weaving, knotting and felting.

15:00 WORKSHOP PART 1

The art of governing versus the art of felting.

Natural dyes and pigments in the Alentejo landscape.

SUNDAY 5th May

9:00-13:00 WORKSHOP PART 2

Carding

Individual felting of a piece

17:30 Program Conclusion

MATERIALS INCLUDED

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