CRYPT RESIDENCY: ANITA WADSWORTH

7 July -11 July        10:15am – 2.15pm

Saturday 12 July   11:00am – 3pm
Sunday 13 July      12:15pm – 4.15pm

I have a background in choreography and poetry, sometimes combining the two by making text an object for the body to explore. My artwork often draws attention to the absent, resting, or rebellious body. Repetitive actions like sewing, knitting, and writing allow me to regulate and create.

Earlier this year, I created a dress for The Shop for Mortals and All Fools by Vinicius Salles, using vintage paper patterns. It feels like a quiet collaboration between new stories and old memories left by those who cut the shapes before. There are tiny handwritten messages in the creases, faded paper bags tat encase them.

In the crypt, I will be testing how a new dress could physicalise my poetry: hanging them side by side, or stitching my words within the pattern. By not following the markings, I explore ideas about identity and gender. Inviting other people to tear part of a dress for me to fix and repair plays with ideas about illness, power and control.

Writing makes heavy things sit light on the page in my hands. In precarious stitches and fraying seams, the weight of memory is so light it could easily blow away, if I let go.