Dunedin based jeweller, Victoria McIntosh, who frequently incorporates textiles into her work, is currently exhibiting in Auckland at Masterworks Gallery, Ponsonby Road. The blanket is central to her exhibition Smother (on until 24 July).
‘According to McIntosh the words envelop, wrap, enshroud and surround are only a lexical nudge from smother. The blanket that warms and covers can smother and choke. On a national tour, Smother presents new works that teeter between forms of warm-comfort and harmful restriction to explore the process of creating and presenting oneself to the world.
‘In her works, McIntosh has stitched together cream antique blanket as if it were an Elizabethan ruff; embellished with pearls and fluttering white cotton threads. In other pieces, gelatine pills and antique pastry boats have been used. The works of Smother are, first and foremost collectable objects that relate to the body and its socialisation. They are elegantly beautiful while they push the boundaries of what can be worn.’