Patti Taylor

I am a London based textile artist, bookbinder and printmaker. Before I retired I was an IT consultant and teacher trainer, primarily showing educators how to use technology in their work. I hadn’t done anything ‘arty’ since I was 14, but coming up to retirement I knew I needed to do something different. A life-long learner, I enrolled on various courses at CityLit and, as luck would have it, my first long course was with Louise Baldwin. I attended her classes for more than ten years, culminating with the two-year Advanced Textiles course. During this time I also spent a year studying printmaking, two years on the Fine Art course, and also studied bookbinding.

Although I was not an artist, I was always a maker – making my own clothes and those for my children. In my twenties I taught myself marquetry, and had a couple of solo exhibitions in Manchester. I stopped when success meant I took on commissions – which I hated – and discovered that creating to order is not for me.

I lived in Mallorca for several years and spent the summers at sea on a 40ft yacht, where I had room for a small pleater and smocked frocks for my daughter. I had always knitted, including experimental patterns for a designer, and bought the odd embroidery kit for fun. I had always loved the tactility of textiles.

My father was a traditional printer and, growing up with the smell of ink, I was drawn to the techniques of printmaking, which led into a love of bookbinding. My successful submissions to the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition have all been books.

My triggers come from various real-life experiences. An emotional response to an event will spur me to dig deeper into why my interest was initially aroused and to objectively analyse my own reactions. Sometimes this generates its own ever-widening research project. My daughter was diagnosed with a life changing, but not life threatening, benign brain tumour just before her 21st birthday. She had two brain operations and radiotherapy, and the projects about her helped us both deal with it. Similarly, after many operations throughout my life, I had a colostomy in the middle of COVID, followed by four major operations; this led to a re-working of a body print in Here Am I, shown at the Art Pavilion, Espacio and House of Smalls.

At other times it leads to a gathering of evidence to support broader themes, or I may work to an externally set topic for an exhibition or event – but these are always morphed into my own viewpoint.

Drawn to a story or narrative which leads to research around the subject, I am often spurred by fleeting emotional perceptions which, once articulated, can send me on unexpected tangents. I continue to develop technical skills to present my subsequent thought-provoking images.

I often work in different media around an idea – for instance, my original Spurn textile book led to a smaller book which led to a wall hanging which was followed by a concertina book. Small embroideries may later evolve into etchings, and so on. I really like to explore a topic.

I am fascinated by people and spend hours wondering why humans behave in the way they do. This triggered Of course I’m not, featuring men ‘not looking at porn’, which was exhibited at the Art Pavilion with PRISM in 2024.

I also like to use humour in my work, and take photos of everyday life in London. Photos of manspread on the tube led to Mind the Gap (see image above) and more recently photos of everyday life in London resulted in three pieces for an exhibition with Phoenix Textiles at the Barbican Library.

For our exhibition, Worn, in October 2023 I looked at what we decide not to reveal about ourselves, the emotions we try to keep hidden. I repurposed men’s suit jackets and used colour and stitch to convey the various emotions. I used colours associated with feelings: red – lust, hate; orange – psychosis, suspicion; brown – illness; yellow – cowardice/fear; green – envy; blue – melancholy; purple – rage; black – corruption. The stitching nearer the centre, where the emotion is felt, is larger and more dynamic, and nearer the edge of the garment it is more subdued, more hidden. Two of the jackets were from charity shops, but I had a connection to the others: two of the hangings were from one of my husband’s suits, another was half a jacket from a late friend, given to me, with another jacket, when we celebrated Clive’s life; another had been blagged from Joe Allen, a bespoke tailor.

Donated men’s suiting, wool and thread; hand stitched

“It was consensual“

It was consensual, in the darkroom, featured three LBDs stitched in iridescent threads with remarks, usually off-the-cuff, made to women by men. During the exhibition a visitor suggested that I should put a whiteboard outside the room for visitors to add their own! These pieces evolved from my work with jackets.

Dresses from charity shops, iridescent paints and threads, recycled earrings. Hand painting, machine and hand stitch.

Baby boomer women will remember playing with cardboard dolls and dressing them in the latest fashions – paper clothes with little tabs to hold them on. This limited edition book harks back to that time, using beautiful fabrics as well as papers.  Whilst I made everything in the books, my neighbour, Ava Clarke, aged 8, made many of the additional outfits.

Cartridge and other papers, some hand printed; fabric scraps, some vintage, embellishments, paints and inks

Disappointed that textiles2020 were not exhibiting annually, in 2024 I decided to challenge myself to apply for Open Calls – and much to my surprise was accepted for 22 shows during the year. (I won’t do it again!)

I also like to mix with other creatives and am an active member of several textile groups (PRISM and Phoenix Textiles), and was recently invited to become a founder member of LAB (London Artist Bookbinders).

Member, Phoenix Contemporary Textiles
Member, Prism
Member, London Artists Books
Member, Printmakers Council
Member, Designer Bookbinders
Member, Society of Bookbinders

Instagram: @patti.taylor44
Website: www.patti-taylor.co.uk

Exhibitions

A Letter in Mind: The Wonder of Colour, National Brain Appeal, Gallery Different, London, Oct/Nov 2024
Land Water Sky, Open Gallery, Halifax, Sept-Oct 2024
Woven, Fox Yard Studio, Stowmarket, Sept 2024
London Life, Phoenix Textiles, Barbican Library, London. Sept 2024
The Drowned World, 54 The Gallery, Mayfair, London, Sept 2024
Skulls & Bones, Fronteer Gallery, Sheffield, Aug-Sept 2024
History Present Future, Open Gallery, Halifax, Yorkshire, Aug-Sept 2024
Moral Fibre, House of Smalls, Edinburgh, Aug 2024
Celebrating Yorkshire, Badger in the Wall Gallery, Clapham, N Yorkshire, Aug 2024
Tiny Landscapes, Fronteer Gallery, Sheffield, July-Aug 2024
Flowers, Fronteer Gallery, Sheffield, July-Aug 2024
Seven is a secret never to be told, J/M Gallery, Portobello, London, July 2024
Fox Yard Studio Summer Exhibition, Stowmarket
Royal Academy Summer Exhibition, Piccadilly, London, June-August 2024
Something Wicked this Way Comes, 54 The Gallery, Shepherd Market, Mayfair, London, June 2024
The Sea, Fronteer Gallery, Sheffield. May-June 2024
International Textile Exhibition, Queen Street Gallery, Neath, Wales. May-June 2024
Murmuration, J/M Gallery, Portobello, London, May 2024
Edgelands, PRISM, The Art Pavilion, London, April 2024
Dark Materials Tell Stories, J/M Gallery, Portobello, London, April 2024
Salt and Stars, J/M Gallery, Portobello, London, March 2024
Persephone Rising, 54 The Gallery, Shepherd Market, Mayfair, London, March 2024
A Letter in Mind: Changing Perspectives, The National Brain Appeal, Gallery Different, London, November 2023
Worn, textiles2020, Espacio Gallery, London, October 2023
Fishy Tales (a collaborative project), Festival of Quilts, NEC Birmingham, August 2023
The Director’s Cut, Woolwich Contemporary Print Fair online exhibition, July 2023
Warped, PRISM, The Art Pavilion, London. April/May 2023
Piece by Piece, CityLit Art Gallery, February 2023
Collateral (see 2022) also exhibited in Cotton: labour, land and body, Crafts Council Gallery, 2022-23
A Letter in Mind: A Sense of Movement. The National Brain Appeal, Gallery Different, London, November 2022
Stories in Stich, textiles2020. Espacio Gallery, London, April 2022
Untold Stories, Prism Textiles, The Art Pavilion, London, March 2022
Royal Academy Summer Exhibition, Piccadilly, London, September 2021-January 2022
A Letter in Mind, The National Brain Appeal, London, November 2021
Collateral, British Textiles Biennial 2021 (contribution to Brigid McLeer’s installation) Queen Street Mill, Lancashire, 2021
Printmakers’ Council Archive, work included in the permanent collection at the Scarborough Museums Trust, 2021
Sewn Antidote. Contributed to a collaborative textile artwork on reflections to the first lockdown of the COVID pandemic conceived and stitched together by Lara Hailey. Accepted as part of the Victoria and Albert Museum’s textile collection, 2020
textiles2020: the show, Espacio Gallery, London, December 2020
In Transition, CityLit Gallery, Covent Garden, London, February-March 2020
Woolwich Contemporary Print Fair, Arsenal, London, November 2019
Construction Sites, CityLit, Covent Garden, London, July 2019
London Print Studio Summer Show, Kilburn, London, July 2019
Meanwhile, R K Burt Gallery, London, July 2019
Woolwich Contemporary Print Fair, Arsenal, London, October 2018
London Print Studio Summer Show, Kilburn, London, July 2018
Pressing Time, R K Burt, London, June 2018
CLFA Final Show, Espacio Gallery, London, July 2017
Stuff of Life, Whitehouse Arts, Cambridge, November 2015
Human Attitudes: an exhibition of modern marquetry, Portico Library, Manchester; solo exhibition, March 1976
Marquetry, Lantern Gallery, Manchester; solo exhibition, October 1975