Transmediating Sky Blanket: tensions with a digital jacquard loom

Video

This pictorial presents an ongoing collaboration between a Haida/Kwakwaka’wakw/Irish artist and a multi-disciplinary team of settler researchers around Sky Blanket, a hybrid Yeil Koowu (Raven’s Tail) and Naaxiin (Chilkat) style woven robe. We elaborate on our collaborative commitments that include a focus on materiality and particular team dynamics. We report on three frictions we experienced while working on a TC2 jacquard loom: the translation of weaving patterns from one production technique to another, working within the material limitations of the loom, and the design of a woven box that allowed us to articulate differing perspectives on failures. In our discussion, we argue that these material encounters are a way for design and creation research to work through tensions at play between digital technologies, artistic practices, and cultural continuities.