We are excited to announce our first creative partnership with University for the Creative Arts, Farnham. Hear My Voice is an innovative series of textile art interventions in the manor house and garden that visitors will discover as they explore. Distinguished British artists Beverly Ayling-Smith, Anne Jackson, Alice Kettle and Carol Quarini will create new artworks in response to West Horsley Place's history and stories of women living and working here across the centuries. While many of the women of West Horsley Place are known and celebrated, there are many names that have been lost to time and many voices that were suppressed.
The artists work will respond to these unheard and forgotten stories, giving a voice to the forgotten women of West Horsley Place through their creative responses to our historic spaces. They will be joined in the project by internationally renowned Japanese artist Machiko Agano, who's extant work Womanhood and Water will also be part of Hear My Voice.
The project will be curated by Emerita Professor of Textile Culture at UCA Farnham Lesley Millar, her colleague from Manchester Metropolitan University, Professor Alice Kettle and Arts, Heritage & Learning Manager Clare Clinton.
Clare Clinton said,
'West Horsley Place has a unique spirit of place and an incredibly rich history. We want to share our hidden stories and explore creative ways that our community can experience our spaces and be enriched by their time here. We are so excited to collaborate with these brilliant artists and UCA Farnham to give a voice to the many hidden women of our past, and cannot wait to see how they interpret and respond to our heritage. From August to October all visitors to the manor house and walled gardens will discover these artworks in different and unexpected places, depending on where- or which- spaces and stories have sparked inspiration for the artists. I hope that these artworks will ignite curiosity and enable visitors to access our remarkable history in a new and unconventional way."
Lesley Millar said,
"Hear My Voice has been developed from the themes that have emerged from Alice and my book Reading the Thread. There are so many cultural, social and personal unspoken stories held within cloth and we wanted reveal this potential to the public. West Horsley Place with its amazing, layered, histories became a dream venue for us to show textiles that have been created by contemporary artists in order to shine a light on those whose voices, over the centuries, have not been heard but whose lives are embedded in the fabric of the building.
There is a sister exhibition, Soft Power, at the Royal West of England Academy in Bristol in which we explore the global political and community use of textiles as material witness."
How to see the exhibition
Hear My Voice will be showing in the manor house and walled garden during Aug, Sept and Oct.
They can be enjoyed by visitors who are attending an event in the manor house during that time period.
The best way to enjoy the exhibition is to visit us on an Open Day.
This exhibition is free and there is no cost to add to your event ticket.
Images courtesy of Beverley Ayling-Smith and Anne Jackson.
