British textile artist Freddie Robins creates sculptures using knitting, both hand and machine. She explores ‘pertinent contemporary issues of the domestic, gender and the human condition. My work subverts these preconceptions and disrupts the notion of the medium being passive and benign.’

Firstly where are you based?

I am now based in Essex. We moved here from London about ten years ago, converting a 16^th Century timber framed barn into a huge live work-space. I share my studio with my husband, Ben Coode-Adams, who is also an artist. We often exhibit and undertake projects together under the collective title, Blackwater Polytechnic http://blackwaterpolytechnic.com/

What is your background in textiles? 

My godmother, my mother’s childhood friend Pamela Darking, who I was very close to, was a skilled and creative needlewoman. She learnt her skill from her father who was a tailor. She made me toys and clothes throughout my childhood. When I was a child she would make the same clothes that she made me in a smaller size for my favourite doll, Amanda. I still have Amanda and her full set of clothes. She stands in a large glass cabinet and is currently wearing a 1970’s cheesecloth shirt, patchwork skirt and hand made sandals. When I was a teenager she would copy clothes that I could not afford to buy. I saw how much joy and satisfaction she got from her creative skills and wanted this for myself. She was also single woman, lived in her own ‘pad’ and appeared so free. I wanted to emulate her spirit. Of course I was only seeing what she allowed me to see but it is totally down to her love of making that set me off on my creative path. Pam died shortly after I completed my MA in Textiles at the Royal College of Art. I think of her often, and hope that she would enjoy my work.

Before studying at the Royal College of Art I studied Constructed Textiles, specialising in Knitted Textiles, at Middlesex Polytechnic. My tutor at both Middlesex and the RCA was the indomitable John Allen. He was the most supportive tutor, allowing everyone to develop along their own path. One of the reasons that I teach myself is because I was fortunate enough to have exceptional tutors when I was a student. I am now back at the RCA as Senior Tutor for Knitted Textiles and Reader in Textiles. It was, and still is, the best place in the world to study Textiles.

How do you describe your art?

I use knitting to make non-functional objects. In other words sculpture. I trained as a designer with a strong emphasis on the craft and skill of knitting but my current work sits pretty firmly within the sphere of contemporary art.

Is knit is your main technique? if so what is it that appeals to you about knit?

Yes knitting is my main technique. It’s what I do best, be it by hand, on a domestic knitting machine or through the use of digital, automated machinery. I love knitting because by passing a length of fibre between two sticks, or across a bed of needles, you can create a piece of fabric or a three-dimensional form. Witchcraft!

Knitting has long held associations with women, practicality, comfort and warmth. Women’s busy fingers never resting, justifying sitting down and watching TV, or more recently a fashionable activity to undertake in public, social settings; Stitch ‘n Bitch clubs and Yarn Bombing. I do none of these things. I spend my time in a studio knitting alone, dedicated and designated time to knit, knitting inherently useless things. Knitting is my way of interpreting, communicating and coming to terms with, the world that I inhabit. It sits between me, and my internal world, and the physical world around me, like some form of knitted comfort or rather discomfort blanket. My knitting practice questions conformity and notions of normality. I use knitting to explore pertinent contemporary issues of the domestic, gender and the human condition. My work subverts these preconceptions and disrupts the notion of the medium being passive and benign.

How do you work? 

I do use sketchbooks, but not as often as I intend to. I mainly use them to record ideas so that they don’t get forgotten. By drawing I am making a commitment, it’s like making a contract with myself to make the piece of work.

Your work is very conceptual. Can you talk us through the thinking behind Craft Kills and Bad Mother?

Craft Kills is the first work that I made inspired by the politics of craft and the medium of textiles. I am constantly frustrated and angered by the low regard in which textiles, in particular knitting, are held. The lack of value afforded knitting being rooted in its association with the domestic and the female, evidencing society’s entrenched gender inequalities. Craft Kills is a seminal work. It paved the way for the feminist works that I have since produced. 

Craft Kills is a self-portrait based on the well recognised image of Saint Sebastian being martyred.  Instead of arrows piercing my skin I have knitting needles.  The title immediately brings to mind the old adage of “dying for your art” but what I am much more concerned with is the stereotypical image that craft, and in particular knitting, has, of being a passive, benign activity.  How would it be if craft was considered as dangerous or subversive?  What if you weren’t allowed to knit, knitting was banned? Shortly after making this piece of work the world suffered the events of September 11^th. As a result you could no longer fly with knitting needles in your hand luggage and most charity shops kept their needles ‘behind the counter’. Knitting was now classed as a dangerous activity.

In Bad Mother I have filled an industrially knitted body with builder’s expanding foam, severed an arm from it using a bread-knife, pushed a bunch of broken and bent knitting needles into the end of the arm, voodoo style, and embellished it with red lurex tubular knitting spelling out the words BAD MOTHER. The ‘O’ of mother has been turned into a sequined eye crying crystal tears. The phrase BAD MOTHER came from something that was said to me at Christmas. One of my daughter’s school classroom assistants loves to knit. Last December she said that she would knit my daughter a cardigan as she knew that I would never get round to it. On Christmas Eve her husband brought it over, as he handed me the package he said two words, not ‘Happy Christmas’ but ‘Bad mother.’ When exhibiting it through the Crafts Council’s exhibition, COLLECT, at the Saatchi Gallery, London, UK, six months later, a man congratulated me on what he saw as a ‘very honest admission.’  

You’ve exhibited in a huge number of galleries internationally. What is your career highlight to date? 

Probably exhibiting in, Radical Lace & Subversive Knitting, at the Museum of Arts and Design (MAD) in New York. Although having my work bought by the Victoria & Albert Museum was a high, as was my recent sale of, Crafts Kills, to the Crafts Council Collection.

Do you have any advice for aspiring textile artists? 

As an educator I am obviously a big advocate of education. Go and study Textiles. Study to the highest level that you can afford to. Beg, steal or borrow the money to do so, but do pick your courses carefully. They vary enormously. Find out who is going to teach you. What are the graduates from the course doing? You want a good education but you also want to be surrounded by other students who share your passion and ambition. If you aren’t in a position to undertake a full-time, or a long-term, course there are plenty of excellent short courses, day courses or even tutorials on instagram or You Tube delivered by highly skilled and creative makers.

Any creativity needs feeding. Don’t starve yourself of inspiration or time. It takes a long time, a lot of commitment and determination. Take creative risks. Don’t be scared to fail. I have failed a fair bit, and still do. At the time it’s disappointing and frustrating but it doesn’t matter in the long run. However you do have to have something to say, and be competent enough to say it through your chosen material and process. 

Be true to yourself and your creative voice. Be confident.

www.freddierobins.com