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ISSN 1039-3498 | no. 48| December 2000


Two years and five million stitches in time

Alice Keetle, World renowned English Textile artist

World-renowned English textile artist, Alice Kettle, stands in front of the embroidered panels in the Main Reading Room recently installed at the National Library of Australia

Two years and five million stitches after the work began, a set of four embroidered panels entitled Australian Landscapes I–IV by renowned English textile artist, Alice Kettle, have been installed in the Main Reading Room of the National Library of Australia.

Alice Kettle flew from London to Canberra in September to supervise installation of the panels, measuring close to four metres long and two metres wide, that have taken up her limited studio space over the past 18 months. Privately commissioned and in memory of Patsy Hardy, a friend and user of the Library for much of her life, Australian Landscapes I–IV, reflect the relationship between reader and library, people and landscape. During her time as artist-in-residence at the Australian National University in 1997, Ms Kettle was invited to take on the commission and spent over two years researching, designing and creating the embroidered panels.

‘Since coming to Australia in 1997, my work has explored connections between landscape and people,’ Ms Kettle said. ‘This work is inspired by the stunning beauty of the Australian landscape, combined with a response to the collections and study within the National Library of Australia.’ Using a technique involving machine embroidery, Ms Kettle uses fine threads stitched across the surface and many of these are metallic, ‘so as to capture the luminescence of the shifting light and the brilliance of the landscape colour’.

Ms Kettle spent hours in the Library researching her design for the panels, including ‘watching people in the Reading Room, listening to the sounds of Australia in the oral archive, holding the original works of art in the pictorial collections and walking among the miles of books in the stacks’.

The result is a series of vivid, beautiful and inspirational embroidered artworks that enliven the ambience of the Main Reading Room of the National Library of Australia.
—Jenny Trustum

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