Shepherd's Touch, To Dye For Exhibition, Textiel Museum Tilburg

Shepherd's Touch, To Dye For Exhibition, Textiel Museum Tilburg

By: Claudy: 10-05-2022

Created in 2022 as part of the group exhibition 'To Dye For' at the Textiel Museum in Tilburg, Shepherd's Touch is Claudy Jongstra's first ever woven artwork. The work was inspired by a 2,800-year-old fabric recently found in an Iron Age burial site unearthed in Noord-Brabant (the south of The Netherlands). Scientists discovered a houndstooth pattern in the fabric, thought to be one of the oldest woven patterns. Natural dyeing was paramount to the development of the work. Throughout the process, Jongstra consulted the archive of the TextielMuseum and reconstructed various historical dye recipes dating from 1800 to 1850. As a result, Jongstra managed to create a range of blue tones by dyeing the fabric with natural pigments such as woad, indigo and madder.