loomeweight II is a new performance project for one loom and two singers, devised collaboratively by Hestor Dart and Patricia Auchterlonie, unfolding over 45 minutes of weaving and sound.

 

loomeweight is a ritual of remembering the un-rememberable, a gathering of voices and threads, a story told in increments, unravelling and finding itself through its sharing. The performers sit across from each other, the weight of their bodies providing the necessary tension for weaving. The structure of the loom is an homage, an imagined version of a historical loom used by cultures across the world. As we weave, we sing. Two tapestries are made:  one physical, woven from ‘trash’ or rejected and broken items (e.g. plastic bags, rope, discarded clothing etc) and one of sound,  an obscured map built from the fragments of folk songs, sounds of mechanical looms, archival recordings of voices. loomeweight II gathers remnants of a broken aural / tactile tradition and reimagines / reforms / reconstitutes these fragments into a new language.

 

loomeweight critiques the failures inherent in a system which promotes consumption over the sustainable processes of creating and community building. loomeweight explores the omnipresent theme of ecological collapse, repurposing discarded objects into something of value. loomeweight II remembers lost traditions, dislocated communities and the weavers who suffered and starved; the collateral damage of industrialisation.

 

loomeweight works in opposition to correctness. loomeweight is a celebration of trash. Those who come to witness loomeweight are welcomed - they become a part of the weaving and the calling. loomeweight is vulnerable. loomeweight is impractical. loomeweight is playful. loomeweight is persistent.