Artist Profile - Sarah Walker
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Biography
Sarah Walker is a qualified UK textile artist whose work incorporates stitched plant fibre papers and in this case ordanance survey maps. She has an eye for detail and her work is beautifully executed and greatly admired. The inspiration for her ArtShades - unusually colourful lampshades, comes from her love of stained glass windows and Byzantine mosaics. She is particularly interested in the play of light and the intensity of colour. Sarah likes to combine practicality with aesthetics and has achieved this with her ArtShades. She creates functional feature lighting which is a work of art in its own right. The diversity of colour and pattern ensures her lamps look as good in a period cottage as they do in a contemporary apartment. Sarah is a supporter of British craft traditions and works with UK makers to create and market her work. She is an exhibiting member of the Worcestershire Guild of Designer Craftsmen.
Artist Statement
Most contemporary textile artists look beyond the world of fabric and thread for design inspiration for their work. Mine comes from the study of decorative mosaics and my eternal fascination for stained glass windows. Both art forms make use of the play of light, whether transmitted or reflected. This aspect, together with the resultant jewel-like colours, provides me with endless enthusiasm for the exploitation of colour and light in my work. I choose to work with plant fibre papers primarily because they are produced from regenerated sources; no tree needs to be felled to make them. In addition, they have a natural beauty which is enhanced by the passage of light and which is hard to find in machine-made fabrics. My colour combinations are inspired by flowers. I love to photograph plants as they burstinto bloom in my hillside garden. By making bespoke lampshades I am creating one-off pieces of contemporary craft which I hope satisfy that craving in us all to own something special that no-one else has and which personalises our house to become a home.