Out of the Blue Exhibition

The Out of the Blue Exhibition and workshops took place at Care Co-ops on 2nd April 2014. Volunteers from marginalised groups have been learning traditional crafts and creating pieces of work inspired by the colour blue and the history of woad. In addition to creating pieces of their own work, they have been training to become craft trainers to teach members of the public.

The exhibition was an opportunity for them to display their artwork in pottery, textile crafts, painting, and gardening with woad. There were also a series of open workshops for members of the public which were run by volunteers and these included paper weaving, tapestry and painting with woad.

The volunteers told members of the public about the woad dye and how they find it different to chemical dyes, “the process of using woad is more complicated and it is quite smelly but you get more interesting colours” and explained the inspiration for their artworks. Exhibiting and getting feedback on their work and the craft workshops has lead the volunteers to develop new ideas to create woad dyed t-shirts as one of their future projects.