</unravel;> is a performance of the making of a knitted manifesto which unravels ideas and preconceptions of binarisms: craft and design, analogue and digital, female and male, zeroes and ones.
Our aim is to challenge gender stereotypes of male-dominated computer hacking, and the domestic female ‘quick and easy’ hobby of knitting.
By looping together conceptual threads, we connect the nodes in a network composed of our research and influences. The project also explores the communal spirit of a craft; a space in which people can share thoughts and opinions: craft as a vehicle for political change.
The medium becomes the message. We decided to talk about binarisms by using the binary system par excellence: weaving is the first form of programming.
Using a hacked knitting machine, this project aims to re-create a communal space where DIY open source coding projects and craft activities bring people together to aspire to change.
The content was knitted and revealed (unraveled) day by day, during the week of the Degree Show: 2, Central Saint Martins,19-24 June 2018, GCD studios, and included an introduction, 4 Chapters and a bibliography. The cubical installation was designed to reflect upon the hybrid usage of technologies, and in this, the knitting machine functions as a printer, although ‘printing’ on textile.
The collection of knitted texts features extracts and quotes by Margaret Atwood, Sadie Plant, Marshall McLuhan, Ada Lovelace, Monique Wittig, Donna Haraway, Anni Albers, Ann Hamilton, Michel Foucault, Sigmund Freud, Gilles Deleuze- just to name a few.
This project would not have been possible outside of the GCD Makerspace, run by senior lecturer Jaap de Maat and artist-studio assistant Mike McShane, at Central Saint Martins, as well as the technical help and support of Rodney Wilson, Specialist Knit Technician, the excellent reading suggestions of our tutor, Ken Hollings and all the GCD staff and colleagues who promptly jumped in to help us with every technical and non issue and who we sincerely thank.
