Tangle, 56 x 56 cm
Negative Spaces, Positive Times, 126 x 94 cm
Thrall, 1 metre diameter
War of Words, 130 x 112 cm
Sara Impey
UK
www.saraimpey.com
UK
www.saraimpey.com
Sara is a British textile artist specialising in stitched text. A former journalist, she writes her own material in thread using the technique of free-motion machine embroidery. This is labour-intensive, but gives her the flexibility and precision to devise the text as she's actually stitching, so that the words often go straight from her brain to her needle. Her subjects include social, political and sometimes personal concerns, often treated with a dash of humour. She likes to work on the edge of the absurd.
The text is an integral part of the design, covering the whole surface, enabling her to play with language through texture, pattern and colour. The use of text both as a design element and tool for communication opens up an inexhaustible area of expressive potential.
Sara's background is domestic quilt making and all her work conforms to the traditional definition of a quilt – two or more layers joined together with stitch. However, she is very free in her interpretation and some recent pieces are three-dimensional.
Sara's work has appeared in many publications and is in the collections of the Victoria & Albert Museum in London, the American Museum of Arts and Design in New York, the International Quilt Museum in Nebraska and The Quilters' Guild Collection in the UK.
She writes and lectures on her work and her book 'Text in Textile Art' was published in 2013. She has been a member of Quilt Art since 2000.