A costume artwork and co-curated exhibition, commissioned as part of the 20/20 project by UAL Decolonising Arts Institute and Manchester Art Gallery. The project was developed working in response to the gallery’s textile and dress collection to consider legacies of expansionism, colonialism and exploitative labour inherent to the material history of cotton and the development of the city of Manchester.
The Warp / The Weft / The Wake, 2025
Exhibition installation view
Photo © Michael Pollard; Image courtesy of the artist and Manchester Art Gallery
The project involved dialogue with the gallery’s curatorial team, workshops with local residents, and research with emerging researchers in partnership with Global Threads. The artwork was developed in collaboration with costumier Jennifer Graham; with production input from Quarry Bank Mill and Orto Print Studio.
Photo © Michael Pollard; Image courtesy of the artist and Manchester Art Gallery
Designed to be activated through a performance lecture, the costume artwork is based on a Victorian silhouette. It conjures the presence and voice of African American abolitionist Sarah Parker Remond, who delivered an anti-slavery speech at the Athenaeum – now part of Manchester Art Gallery – In 1859.
In dialogue with this site and its archives, the layers of the dress are printed with a ‘Manchester check’ design from a collection pattern book. Also known as ‘Guinea cloth’, these woven check textiles were made to supply slave trading voyages and were key to the growth of the Lancashire cotton industry. Here, these check patterns are cut through with red lines referencing the grids of an accounting book. The inner layers reveal the patterns of marbled end papers of the Royal Manchester Institute subscribers’ logbooks. The costume takes on the expanded form of one of these books, aiming to look beyond the names of those whose money was assigned to the founding of the institution, to signpost towards the names that are not included; and to think about whose labour facilitated the wealth that was then invested into the institution.
The costume is being acquired by Manchester Art Gallery, as part of the 20/20 project, initiated by UAL Decolonising Art Institute.
The Warp / The Weft / The Wake, 2024
Costume: dress, corset, petticoat, crinoline and undergarments
Screen printed woven cotton, cotton thread, steel boning, mother of pearl
Photo © Michael Pollard; Image courtesy of the artist and Manchester Art Gallery
The Warp / The Weft / The Wake, 2024
Costume: dress, corset, petticoat, crinoline and undergarments
Screen printed woven cotton, cotton thread, steel boning, mother of pearl
Photo © Michael Pollard; Image courtesy of the artist and Manchester Art Gallery
The Warp / The Weft / The Wake, 2024
Costume: dress, corset, petticoat, crinoline and undergarments
Screen printed woven cotton, cotton thread, steel boning, mother of pearl
Photo © Michael Pollard; Image courtesy of the artist and Manchester Art Gallery
The Warp / The Weft / The Wake, 2024
Costume: dress, corset, petticoat, crinoline and undergarments
Screen printed woven cotton, cotton thread, steel boning, mother of pearl
Photo © Michael Pollard; Image courtesy of the artist and Manchester Art Gallery
Photo © Michael Pollard; Image courtesy of the artist and Manchester Art Gallery
Photo © Michael Pollard; Image courtesy of the artist and Manchester Art Gallery
Names of Parties who have assented to pay the Annual Guinea, 2025
Digital print and screenprinted varnish
Photo © Michael Pollard; Image courtesy of the artist and Manchester Art Gallery
Photo © Michael Pollard; Image courtesy of the artist and Manchester Art Gallery
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